Spiriting Fluttershy's Dark Sky
by CloudMistDragon555
Summary: The fifth story of Fluttershy's Dark Sky follows Fluttershy, who, upon becoming more withdrawn, embarks on a spiritual journey to discover her true purpose. But little does she know as she is that this journey is not only meant for her, but also for all of the world...
1. Chapter 1

_I will be coming back…_

The conclusion of the Awakening project ended many stories, yet raised many questions regarding the story that started everything...the story of Fluttershy's death and resurrection.

Putting it all together at the end of everything was a trial, to say the least. Logically, from our point of view, none of it made any sense. Why was Twilight Sparkle forced to bloody her hands? Why did she have to bear children, only for them to be caught in the chaos? Who exactly were Myra Michaels, Edward Miles, and the humans who were transformed into her friends?

Regardless though, the project was a success, as the world was given hope of living again.

In one sense…

Stars have come awake thanks to the efforts of Fluttershy, Ninja Time God Rarity, Fantasy God Discord, and the characters whom they have created. But as the true ending never ends, the beginning to the most important story yet can never begin...until we are fully willing to enter another world...and search for an answer to the most important question that we know...

Episode 1: To Make Faith Sight

 _What is life?_

Fluttershy asked herself that question in thought as she watched Angel maniacally chow away at a carrot she had just fed him.

 _Every day, I have to feed these animals as well as myself._

Fluttershy told herself that in her mind as she finished eating a bowl of porridge at the breakfast table.

 _Sometimes I wonder why exactly I do it. I love my pets, but I'd be lying if I didn't admit that sometimes, I feel I follow this routine of caring for them more out of obligation than love…_

Fluttershy said that in her mind as she sat on her bed that afternoon, staring at the blankets, looking sullen.

 _Even though I live a life with no real problems, I can't help but feel that there's more to life than this…_

Fluttershy then closed her eyes tightly, and with a look of resolve on her face, she crossed her back legs together as she sat. Putting her front hooves together, she began to meditate.

 _Enlightenment is what I seek...discovering my ultimate purpose...I want that to give me the motivation I need to do all that I do not out of obligation, but out of pure kindness and love…_

After meditating for some time, Fluttershy began to feel something welling deep within her...the swirl of a strong spiritual essence...Opening her eyes, they gave a bright, yellow glow…

 _...my world..._

 _My life is a journey…_

 _Our lives are intended to be adventures that ultimately lead us to enlightenment and salvation…_

 _Sometimes I wonder how true that really is…_

 _They say you need to have faith to see that it's true...but then they say it's not good enough to just believe…_

 _...so what I believe in is my success in the search for proof…_

As Fluttershy opened her eyes, she realized that she was no longer in her room. She was in a place that looked like space, a dark, starry sky surrounding her. One star in the sky, she noticed was shining brighter than all the other stars as it hovered towards her ominously. Fluttershy gulped and began to grow nervous before a comforting voice from the star said this…

"Do not fear me, redeemed one. It was fate that brought you here, I called you by name. You are mine, Fluttershy, and this sky is yours."

Fluttershy's jaw fell slack. She had an overwhelming feeling of deja vu and tears fell from her eyes as she recognized who this was talking to her.

"You're the ruler of the universe…" she said. "One of the Eternal Three…"

"Precisely." the star replied. "You have arrived here as part of the plan. Just like my daughter, you will also be allowed to give input on how we should redeem this world of the Dark Sky. My daughter has been given charge of the human world, and I want you to have charge of the pony world, Equestria."

"No way...r-really?!" Fluttershy went in shock. "But why me?"

"In your current form," the star went on to explain, "you know the truth not, but your true form is a god. You are the ruler of the Dark Sky, a dimension lost to the Void. A collection of lost worlds seeking to be found. It was you who sent an incarnation of yourself, one with a mortal body and mind, to this world so that you could undergo the same trials and tribulations of the mortals you wish to save. Even though you were inevitably brought here by destiny, at the same time, you also chose this path of your own accord. Do you see what you were trying to do?"

Fluttershy stared at the star blankly for a short while before saying…

"Yes. I wanted to save them not out of obligation, but because I wanted to…just like how my whole purpose for coming here was because I was tired of being good because I felt I had to be and wanted to have an epiphany that would make me want to be good..."

"The purity of your heart is remarkable." the star replied. "Most who are born without an innate sense of justice begin their lives by walking a dark road, for they fully believe that their lives have no greater purpose. Your god self deliberately created you without a natural calling to the light as a test to see if she was truly the chosen ruler of the Dark Sky, the one who would restore its light…"

"M-my creator had that much faith in herself?!" Fluttershy shouted in surprise.

"Don't forget about yourself." the star told her. "Remember that although you are a piece of your creator, you are also separate from your creator."

"..." Fluttershy was silent in response, feeling confused.

"I understand that it is a difficult concept for an untrained mortal mind to grasp." the star said. "But you will soon grow accustomed to taking in ideas you once thought impossible to comprehend. That is not just your fate. That is the fate of every mortal who will be born to the new generation we plan to build. That is the result we foresee of our latest project…"

With those words, the star flew towards the dark sky and split apart in every direction, creating an intense flash of light that blinded Fluttershy. Holding a foreleg to her face, she soon pulled it away to see the stars in the sky now glowing brighter than ever…

"Not the lightening of the dark sky, for these stars were already shining, and I have only made them more radiant. Stronger in the light. This is what we plan to do with mortal souls, make them brighter before sending them to inhabit new bodies. That is why…

...we call it the spiriting."

 _Spiriting Fluttershy's Dark Sky_

Fluttershy awoke from the trance on her bed to find darkness all around her.

"Natural darkness…" she told herself in her mind, quickly realizing that it was night and that she had slept the afternoon away. "I can't believe now that there was a time when I was afraid of it…"

She then got out of her bed and walked over to the window inside her bedroom. Looking out of it, she saw the stars in the night sky that had been put there by Princess Luna.

"Your love has called my name…" Fluttershy said to herself. "What do I have to fear...when you hold all the stars, and even the one who puts the stars here…"

Fluttershy said all of that as she smiled a warm, gentle, hope-filled smile…

...that was unfortunately unaware of the fact that she was not the only one suspecting that this world was actually…

… ….. .. …..

Meanwhile...

Twilight Sparkle was thinking these thoughts to herself as she laid down on her bed staring at the ceiling one night.

 _These thoughts keep me awake at night for hours...thoughts of philosophy...greater meaning...my purpose…_

 _I wonder why I think them...why me…_

 _My name is Twilight Sparkle, Princess of Friendship. I'm happy and content. I love my life and my friends. How is it that…_

 _Even that isn't enough to push these thoughts away when I'm all alone like this? Is it just a habit of my brain? Or could it be my mind's inability to sleep, as it senses that…_

 _Something is coming. Something that will make me realize that there's more to me...and more to all…_

Twilight then looked out the window by her bed and saw the moon and stars that glowed brightly in the dark sky…

In Canterlot Castle, that same night…

Princess Luna was in bed, sleeping after having created that night's beautiful sky. She was having a dream. A dream involving her standing on a platform of bright light hovering in the starry night sky and meeting two figures. One was Rarity, dressed in a black robe with an emblem of a sword on it, and the other was Discord, dressed in a white robe with an emblem of a shield on it.

"Rarity? Discord?" Luna asked them as they approached her, slyly grinning at her.

"Good evening, Princess Luna." Rarity politely greeted her. "We are sorry to intrude on your beauty sleep so late. However, we must attend to an urgent matter."

"Whatever would that be?" an uncannily calm and unphased Luna replied.

"Our good friend, Twilight Sparkle, is getting smart." Discord explained.

"Implying there was a time she wasn't smart?" Luna made a sarcastic retort.

"Well, smart in the context we mean." Discord made more clear. "She is beginning to see through our illusion and we can't have her find out the truth right now. You are as aware as all of us that if we let her discover what's really going on too soon, the whole plan will be ruined."

Luna looked down at the ground regretfully for a moment before looking back up at the two and saying…

"Then it can't be helped. For the sake of the Reborn One, I will enhance the power of the illusion I have cast on Twilight…"

Luna's horn then began to emanate an aura of dark blue magic and her eyes turned white. Before long, dark wisps began to emerge from the darkness in the night sky and glowing white wisps began to emerge from the stars shining in the sky.

"SPIRITS OF THE DREAM REALM." Luna proclaimed loudly as the wisps started floating around her. "HEED ME AS I TELL YOU TO INHABIT THE MINDS OF THE ONE CALLED TWILIGHT SPARKLE, AND SHOW HER WHAT HER MISDIRECTED HEART DESIRES TO SEE EVEN AS SHE IS AWAKE."

The wisps answered her command, and left to pursue Twilight. Afterwards, Luna's horn and eyes stopped glowing and she looked at Rarity and Discord.

"Satisfied?" she asked them.

"Satisfactory performance, indeed." Rarity applauded her.

"Very good, thank you." Discord said. "We'll be on our way now. Sleep well."

Rarity and Discord then turned around and walked away, each with a sinister grin on their face.

"Because the time will be long before you sleep again…" they thought.

The next day, when Twilight awoke…

"Twilight!" a familiar voice called Twilight's name.

"Ugh…" Twilight groaned in response.

"TWILIGHT!" Spike called again.

"What is it, Spike?" Twilight said bemusedly as she rose from her bed.

"What is it?" Spike retorted, surprised by Twilight's lethargy. "What is it? Please tell me you're joking!"

"When have I ever?" Twilight replied.

"Hmm…" Spike said, rubbing his claw across his chin, genuinely trying to remember. "I do definitely recall a few times…"

"GUH!" Twilight grumbled as she slammed her head back down onto her pillow. "Whatever it is, I'm sure the fate of Equestria doesn't rest on it…"

"Come on, Twilight!" Spike exclaimed as he got up on the bed. "This REALLY isn't like you! You normally love pretending that the fate of Equestria rests on everything!"

"Yeah, I know…" Twilight replied, maintaining her grouchy, sarcastic tone. "What's causing me to act this way, you've got to solve this mystery! Maybe it's because I'm just at the point of my life where I'm bored of pretending. Maybe I'm just bored of doing the same, predictable shit every day! Maybe I'm just bored of…"

Twilight stopped herself from finishing that sentence, realizing that she was close to saying something she knew she was going to regret. A guilty look came across her face as she turned over to Spike, who did not appear happy.

"Twilight…" Spike said in a tone of despondence. "Do you mean to say that you're bored of...your friends...and me too?"

Twilight was well-aware of the fact that she was in of the most encountered moral dilemmas. To tell the truth and hurt someone's feelings or lie to keep someone feeling content?

"As always, I'll lie…" she told herself, despite feeling shame. "It's the lesser of two evils."

"Of course not, Spike." Twilight said what she wanted to mean wholeheartedly. "You know that I would never grow tired of you or any of my friends."

Saying this with a false smile and sincere-sounding tone, she was apparently able to fool Spike, as he smiled back at her.

"Don't feel bad…" Twilight told herself in a voice that almost felt like it wasn't her own… "All you did was tell him what _should be_ the truth. It isn't my fault that it's a lie. I can't change the way I naturally feel. I'm no god. I can't turn fiction into reality...I CAN ONLY MAKE ILLUSIONS MY REALITY…"

Twilight echoed that last sentence out loud in the voice of Princess Luna, astonishing Spike.

"What the whazzat?" Spike replied, confused.

Spike's reply caused Twilight to snap back to reality. She then shook her head back and forth very quickly.

"Wow, ah ha ha!" she laughed sheepishly. "Early morning talk, huh?"

"Uh...it's well past ten in the morning, Twilight." Spike responded.

"Oh." Twilight went, embarrassed. "Uh...late morning talk, then? It's the same thing granted you only got a few hours of sleep in the early morning."

"...Well, I can't argue with that." Spike replied.

"Ha ha ha ha ha!" the two laughed together.

"I won't argue with you anymore." Twilight said as she got out of the bed and put her four legs on the floor. "It's a pointless argument I wouldn't win anyways. I know I can't stay in bed and sleep forever."

"If only everyone was like you!" Spike exclaimed in a facetious tone. "Ah ha ha ha ha…"

Twilight chuckled, wanting to laugh with him the same way she just had before, but something kept her from doing so…

"Is it because I feel he's genuinely trying to deride me, or…" she thought.

"Hey, don't take it personally!" Spike assured her that he was just kidding. "It's just that my sense of humor's gotten more bitey and dark, it happens naturally as you get older."

Twilight gave Spike the benefit of the doubt and kept chuckling, but deep down, she was worried.

"Is this the same Spike...who would buy that lie I told earlier?" she said in her mind. "He's always had a sense of sarcasm, but...I have a bad feeling…"

"Come on, life's too short to be getting hung up over silly little jokes!" Spike exclaimed. "I'm sure Pinkie Pie will tell you the same thing if you don't want to take it from me!"

"Pinkie Pie?" Twilight asked, unaware of Pinkie's relevancy to what he meant.

"We're going to one of her parties at Sugarcube Corner." Spike explained. "It's a welcoming back party for Maud Pie, remember?"

"Oh yeah, heh heh, right." Twilight replied, feeling abashed. "How could I forget, huh huh…"

As Spike headed on out Twilight's bedroom door, Twilight followed closely behind, trying to hide her feeling of being unnerved…

"How could I...forget…"

Twilight turned around to face her bed one more time before she left.

"How could I forget the times where I only saw that bed as my place to recharge. How did it ever become the only place where I truly felt awake…"

 _You know what they say, Twilight. A machine's soul never sleeps…_

Ninja Time God Rarity said that as she remembered Starcatch from the Awakening project…

In her mind, a purple light flashed on a lavender-colored computer monitor…


	2. Chapter 2

Episode 12: Knowing the Hunter

 _When we are imprisoned, we work and we learn. When we are at work, we can feel like we are in a prison learning about the hardship of life. When we are at school, working hard, we can feel like we are doing it to escape a certain kind of prison…_

… _but what we don't know is that prison is either everywhere or nowhere…_

Later on in the morning, the Dark Sky members were still at the hotel, sitting around a table and eating breakfast. Oddly enough, they were the only ones there...

"Awww…" Derpy Hooves bemoaned. "I wanted breakfast in bed…"

"Ha ha ha..." Dumb-bell laughed in a feigned manner. "And I want to be anywhere but in bed after this morning's fiasco…"

"Please dude," pleaded Hoops, "I said I was sorry. Can we not have this damper our morning?"

"I admit it," interjected Ghost Rainbow Dash in a tone of sincere remorse, "I took that prank too far. Can we please forget about it now?"

"Sure…" Dumb-bell replied facetiously. "And we may as well forget about the next prank you'll pull that will "go too far" while we're at it, because it's apparent you're never going to change."

"For fuck's sake!" G.R.D. exclaimed defensively. "It was one prank!"

"..." Score silently pointed out that G.R.D. was wrong with a flashback to another prank she pulled just the night before when they checked in.

In the flashback, Derpy Hooves was eyeing the fridge they had in their room with interest, but before she could take out one of the cans of soda, Hoops intervened.

"Sorry Derpy, no." he told her. "Those drinks are stupidly overpriced. I don't want you wasting your money."

As Hoops and Derpy trotted away from the fridge, she looked at the can of Coca-Cola she wanted from the transparent door and said in a crestfallen tone…

"I love Coke…"

All of a sudden, the music from that old Chef Boyardee commercial started playing as the fridge door opened by itself, and the can rolled towards Derpy. Feeling it bump against her back hooves, Derpy turned around and gasped with joy. But when she picked it up, G.R.D. came out of the can.

"That'll be thirty-seven dollars." G.R.D. taunted her.

Derpy gasped in horror...at the high price.

"Hoops, the economy is broken from the apocalypse!" she cried as she tossed the can aside and ran to Hoops.

"What, again?" he retorted.

After the flashback ended, Score silently explained the irony of the situation. The can Derpy threw was damaged from the impact, getting soda all over the carpet. The cost to clean the carpet would probably be the same amount of money the hotel had put on the soda. But in spite of his attempt to bring up what happened as an amusing anecdote, no one else seemed to find it funny...except G.R.D..

"Come on," said G.R.D. nonchalantly, "you gotta agree with me, that was a pretty good gag."

"It's not a "PRETTY GOOD GAG" if you're making it at our expense!" Dumb-bell exclaimed, growing more frustrated.

"Jesus Christ, man…" G.R.D. remarked, seeing Dumb-bell grow red in the face. "You look like you're ready to crack over a joke about Coke."

"Fuck this, I'm out!" Dumb-bell yelled as he left the table in a huff. "You want to laugh at everyone's expenses so badly, you can laugh at the hotel bill!"

Dumb-bell began angrily muttering to himself as he went upstairs to pack his bags, while the rest of the gang didn't know what else to do besides muse over what just happened.

"I just don't get what he's so upset about…" G.R.D. said in confusion, shrugging her shoulders. "He knows the way I am."

"He's probably just been really stressed recently because of you-know-what…" Hoops surmised, unaware that you-know-who was approaching. "It does get grating, Fluttershy treating us like her subjects when she's supposed to be our friend. With all the shit that's going on right now, she puts us at the kid's table? Delivering a message? Really? I don't feel any more motivated to complete this lame mission than he does."

"Yeah!" Derpy interjected, trying to be cool, as the rest of the Dark Sky members went quiet upon seeing who was now standing over the breakfast table. "I say we take matters into our own hands and fight Noimman ourselves!"

"..." Score silently warned Derpy that now was as good a time as any to change her stance…

...because Noimman was looming over the breakfast table, wearing a malicious grin on her face. Derpy was now quiet too as she and the others began shaking in fear.

"Don't worry…" she said sarcastically. "I'll take care of the check. And then I'll take care of you…"

Meanwhile, Dumb-bell was packing his things in a suitcase, still displeased with the current state of affairs.

"We're going up against someone far more threatening than we ever thought possible and it's all just a joke to everybody!" he muttered angrily. "First, Fluttershy bails on us. Says we should just "give the heroes a message" instead of joining them in battle because it's NOT OUR BUSINESS YET. Then we find out that one of these heroes is getting into a street fight and taking people's weapons as spoils of war? Gee, I just wish GOD of all beings would make things clear and simple for us!"

"So do I…" Noimman said ominously from behind, frightening Dumb-bell, who stumbled back and fell on the bed in shock. "Oh dear, don't tempt me. When I see someone trembling so anxiously on a bed, I can't help but feel...ecstatic."

"WHAT DID YOU DO TO THE OTHERS?!" Dumb-bell bellowed.

"I stored them safely inside the compartment of this arm…" Noimman explained as she held out her left arm. "But that doesn't mean I can't put you in another place that's more comfortable for me…"

"RRRAAAHHH!" Dumb-bell cried as he tried to grab Noimman's arm and tear it off. In response, however, Noimman pulled her left arm back in time and grabbed Dumb-bell's front hooves, squeezing them tightly.

"Grrrr…" Dumb-bell grunted, struggling. "You're not taking off my forelegs…"

But before he knew it, Dumb-bell felt something else get taken off as Noimman held something in front of him that was dripping with blood in her right fist.

"Why do I feel so much agony…" he remarked, his voice growing weaker. "It feels like a pack of bees are stinging my brain...yet it also feels so cold down there…"

Dumb-bell then gasped when he saw Noimman open her fist and reveal to him the penis she had ripped off his body. It was only seconds later that he saw her crush it in her hand. Fainting from the shock, he collapsed on the bed, where Noimman cruelly poured the blood and testicular fluid that was left in her hand on his face. Cheerfully scattering the remains of the flesh, she looked at the massive wound that was left from his torn penis.

"Fear not." she said, in a facetious manner as always, reaching into her pants. "I'll be sure to patch up that hole...with another hole…"

When Dumb-bell awoke later, he found himself inside of a pitch-black darkness.

"Hello?!" he called out. "Score?! Derpy?! Hoops?! Dash?! Where are you?!"

Then he remembered what Noimman said about putting him in another place...and what she did to his penis…

"No…" he said as he looked down at his former manhood and was terrified to see that in its place...was a vagina.

"NNNNNOOOOO!" he bellowed.

Noimman cackled evilly to herself, hearing him scream inside of her as she left the hotel…

"What a weakling." she scoffed at him. "I went easy on him and his friends because they were the children of God. There truly is no greater punishment than that."

She said this as she passed by a window in a store and stopped to look at her reflection.

"Now if they were _my_ children…" she said in a demonic voice as she saw the reflection change to show her in the form of pure darkness, holding strings in one hand that she held out in front, and in the other hand that she held out from behind, which were connected to four other forms of pure darkness.

"...this would've gotten a lot darker…" she finished as she walked away from the mysterious silhouettes of four men.

Meanwhile, at the school, Adrian and Felix Bruce pushed open the double doors to the school and entered. What laid ahead of them was a long hall, with many people on both sides looking through their lockers. While Adrian and Felix hoped everyone would be too preoccupied to notice their entrance, a sizable crowd of young adults were standing in front of them, shooting them unwelcoming glares.

"Oh boy…" Felix nervously mumbled to himself, still holding the door he had opened. "I think it would be wise to shut this door as quietly as possible…"

Though he gently put his door back in its place, Adrian slammed hers as hard as she could and pressed her right fist into her other hand.

"I hope you mooks just have poor social skills…" Adrian remarked as she made her gesture that she was ready to fight if she had to. "...because there's no way in hell we're putting up with any freshman hazing…"

After she said that, however, she, Felix, and the people blocking their way all heard the sound of two jingle bells ringing. Before long, a pool of pure darkness suddenly appeared on the white, tiled floor. The darkness that came out of it materialized into a woman that shared Noimman's uniform and body structure. Adrian and Felix were surprised by how much she looked like Noimman, almost mistaking her for the aforementioned at first, but quickly noticed the differences in her clothing, hairstyle, and skin tone. This woman's shirt was red rather than blue, her hair was black and long with spiky bangs, and her skin was gray. Discounting that, however, as Adrian and Felix saw that she even wore glasses, which were black, they knew her similar physical appearance was not a coincidence.

"Hey, hey, hold your horses." she told them as she jingled her silver bells, one of which had the insignia of a six-headed serpent, and the other, the insignia of a judge with a white hat and a pen. "These guys aren't looking for a fight."

"We're not?" one guy with red, blue-streaked hair in the crowd blocking the way responded in a mechanical tone of voice.

"I don't like your tone…" the woman said as she began to jingle the bells again.

"We're not!" the guy exclaimed as he and the rest of the crowd walked away.

As they were walking away, the guy caught sight of a woman he found attractive standing by an open locker, looking inside. The woman had a bleach white skin color and a pompadour hairstyle that showed off the crazy combination of green, pink, and blue colors in her hair. For clothing, she wore black parachute pants and a brown leather jacket that she wore over a black suspender vest that also acted as a bra. With nothing under it, the guy was intrigued to see the woman's large breasts hanging...before he saw her smile evilly in the mirror of the locker door...

"Sorry about that," apologized the mysterious woman who emerged from the darkness, "it unfortunately happens a lot here, newcomers being given a cold welcome. My name is Akame. I'm the vice principal of this establishment, Hardnox Institute. What are your names?"

"...I'm Adrian and this is Felix." Adrian answered, gesturing to herself and Felix. She only provided her with their first names, hesitant to give anyone their full names out of distrust.

"So I guess you're like me," joked Akame, "no last name. Makes sense. I always knew Bruce was a first name…"

"Damn!" Adrian thought. "How did she-"

"I told you the truth." Akame said in an assuring tone. "I'm the vice principal of this school and I'm filling in for the regular principal, Noimman, in her absence. She's told me all about you two, and I must say, I'm fascinated by your potential. Otherwise, Noimman would never have granted you the prestigious opportunity that she has..."

Akame rang her bells again, and with that, another pool of darkness emerged from the floor. Putting her bells away in her shirt pocket, she crouched down and pulled a green duffel bag out, the pool disappearing behind it. Opening it, she got out two red cans that looked like soda cans.

"Why don't we drink to celebrate your accomplishment?" she offered as she handed the two cans she got out to the puzzled Adrian and Felix, who took them in hand, accepting the offer as to not make a scene.

Suddenly, however, just as Akame was about to get a drink for herself out of the bag, a deafening shriek of terror could be heard from down the hallway.

"YYYYYAAAAAHHHHH!" the guy who took notice of the woman earlier screamed after having his eyes gouged out. "MY EYES!"

"MWA HA HA HA HA!" the woman laughed loudly in a cartoonish manner, sounding like a man imitating the stereotypical, suave accent of a lady of the upper class. "Now you can't see them…"

She said this as she dropped the eyes in between her breasts, and then squished her breasts together to crush his eyes into a bloody pulp.

"Now you can't see with them ever again!" she declared. "Don't lay your eyes on the prize if it's a booby prize!"

Everyone who witnessed this awful scene groaned in disgust…

"Self-awareness is not automatically funny!" the woman abruptly shouted. "Look at me, I'm yelling! I'm yelling about yelling! I'm yelling about yelling about yelling! Now I'm trapped in an infinite loop! Don't you see? Insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result! That's what self-awareness is, insanity! You're insane if you know you're insane!"

"Aw shit…" Akame grumbled, putting her hand on her face. "She's at it again. That's Crazy Celes, pulling her usual stunts."

"It's usual for her to gouge a dude's eyes out?!" Felix exclaimed. "How has she not been expelled yet?!"

"Don't you know?" Akame retorted. "This isn't just a school. It's a prison work school, a secret experiment Noimman is conducting to test the capabilities of the inhabitants of this world that were put here after the apocalypse that took place in the Transcending project. Because this world is now highly underpopulated, it was extremely easy to gather every prisoner, worker, and student here all under one roof. The government wants to see how all of said faction of human society would react to having to live together in prison as one. Obviously, you should still keep your distance from people like Crazy Celes. Nobody likes them."

"Transcending project?" Felix asked in confusion. "I didn't even know there was an apocalypse…"

"Not just that," interjected Adrian, having a hard time taking any of this seriously, "but we're not prisoners, we've never worked for an actual business, and Felix and I were homeschooled. What purpose do we have for being here if we don't meet the government's criteria?"

"Because you're not here for the same purpose as all the other "riff-raff", Noimman likes to say." Akame explained. "You have a special mission. It should have been explained on the paper your parents got. Didn't they ever show it to you?"

"...Son of a bitch…" Adrian and Felix said in frustration to themselves as they realized that their parents deliberately concealed important information from them.

"Excuse me for skipping the toast," said Akame as she got out a first aid kit from the duffel bag instead of her drink, "but I've got a patient to treat. It's part of my job to help these students out when they get hurt after things get _too_ wild…"

As Akame walked back over to the injured student, she got a chill down her spine when she felt the unpleasant presence of another dangerous student who was strolling around the hall. It was Yata, a man with short and wavy black hair, black pants, and a black shirt that had the symbol of the sun on it. He always had a creepy grin etched on his face, and even more unsettling were the three syringes, the kind used in abortions, stuck in his head. One was on his forehead, the other two were on his cheeks, one for each side. All of them were oozing out a purple aura of dark, oppressive energy, which kept most from wanting to go anywhere near him. Akame became especially uncomfortable when he turned to her and started saying in a chilling tone of voice…

"My brothers...I know what happened to my brothers…"

Akame shivered and started walking by really slowly as to not accidentally sound the bells that were in her shirt pocket.

"Poor kids…" Yata said in thought as he saw Adrian drinking the beverage Akame gave her, while Felix was pouring his into a beaker with a stick embedded on the side. "Akame's found herself a nice couple of pawns to kill the king…"

Yata then looked over at Akame putting a pair of robotic eyes into the student's empty sockets and snickered when he noticed that Celes had disappeared from her spot.

"Test results show…" Felix said as he observed the stick on the beaker, which turned out to be an electronic reader. "...no toxins of any variety. I guess she really did just want to have a drink with us."

"I'm weirdly disappointed." Adrian interjected as she finished her drink. "I was hoping to show off my body's resistance to poison. Oh well…"

Adrian crumpled up the can and tossed it on the floor, which caught the eye of Crazy Celes.

"HEY!" she screamed. "YOU CAN'T JUST THROW TRASH ON THE FLOOR! THAT'S A $500 PARKING TICKET RIGHT THERE! WHAT IF THE HANDICAPPED WANTED THAT SPACE OF THE FLOOR?!"

"If you can commit acts of violence without consequence, what's so bad about me littering?" Adrian asked.

"THERE ARE PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN SHOT FOR LITTERING!" Celes continued shouting. "POLICE BRUTALITY IS REALER THAN YOU, SPONGEBOOBS! PAY ME THE FINE OR ELSE I'LL MAKE YOU PAY!"

"Whoa hoa hoa, that sounds like a threat to me…" Adrian retorted as she pulled out her knife. "And I reserve the right to defend myself…"

But Celes didn't assault Adrian or try to rob her in a tussle. Instead, she waved her right hand, which was glowing with a white aura around it, and Adrian's wallet left her front left pocket, floating right into Celes' hand.

"Ha!" Celes taunted Adrian as she buried the wallet in between her breasts. "I don't care about actually fighting for anything, so long as I get paid!"

Adrian just smirked as she cut the two strings that held up Celes' suspender vest with a swift stroke of her knife, making a slash on the upper area of her chest above her breasts. The vest fell off, and Adrian's wallet fell to the floor, along with the remains of the guy's eyes. Adrian's confident smile turned to a frown of disgust when she grabbed the wallet out of the bloody pulp.

"Serves you right for giving me such unnecessary exposure!" Celes boasted, even with her chest bleeding, the blood dripping down to her breasts hanging in the air. "All you get in the end is blood money!"

"No…" Adrian said in frustration through her teeth. "The greatest satisfaction is getting to mop the FLOOR WITH YOU!"

She then tripped Celes on her front side with a sweep kick to her legs, put her leg on her back, and sent her sliding across the hall. The blood from her chest tracked all across the floor before she finally crashed into a door headfirst. Everyone besides Yata and Akame was now giving Adrian and Felix a blank stare. Having no idea how to react, Felix just quietly hid the beverage Akame gave him in his coat and bristled the hair on the back of his neck. Adrian, surprised by her greater strength than normal of how she kicked Celes all that way, decided to just play along with it…

"If any of you ever try to fuck with us, you'll get what she got!" she proclaimed in a brazen tone of voice. "Comprendes?!"

Meanwhile, Yata and Akame were more interested in the power Adrian displayed as they looked over at Celes.

"Incredible power…" Yata admired the situation in thought. "But it's not enough for Noimman or even a lower-ranked demon god for that matter, hee hee ha…"

"I can see it's already starting to take effect…" Akame happily said to herself as the student she finished fixing up opened his new robotic eyes ominously.

Adrian and Felix were looking at Celes too, only with concern. But as Celes pulled herself off the ground with ease, only feeling dizzy from the damage, their concern turned to shock.

"Ooooohhhhh…" Celes grumbled as she put her hand to her bleeding forehead. "I have such a headache. I guess that's what happens though when you get smashed!"

Adrian and Felix were slack-jawed. What in the world was up with these people?! As they pondered that, the piece of paper that was fluttering outside earlier found itself stuck on one of the classroom windows. One could see that the paper was actually a "WANTED" poster…

...with Noimman's face on it…


	3. Chapter 3

Episode 3: At the End of the Night

 _The hell that I created…_

Twilight Sparkle was musing over the last thing that Fluttershy said to her before she found herself surrounded by darkness…

"What are they talking about?" she asked.

"It would seem that my illusion has worked all too well on you, Princess Twilight Sparkle." the words of a familiar princess could be heard coming from the darkness.

Recognizing the voice, Twilight looked in front of her to confirm the thought…

"Princess Luna!" she cried.

Twilight then tried to run out to her, with the hopes of receiving some comfort from her, but was stopped by something. She felt like something was binding her forelegs...no matter how hard she tried to run towards Luna, she was stopped a fair distance from her by an invisible force that was tugging at her forelegs from behind…

"Why...can't I…" Twilight said to herself in frustration, struggling as she could feel weakness and pain not just in her legs, but throughout her entire body.

"Do not even bother." Luna told her. "Just allow yourself to be swung back by the fictional rope that holds you captive here. The fictional rope that holds you to this fictional prison."

Something dawned on Twilight as she obeyed Luna's order, her eyes widening as she allowed herself to be pulled back by the "rope".

"Oh no no no…" she said as she shook her head, remembering what Luna said about her illusion. "Don't tell me that you're in on this too…"

"You say that as if you would be disappointed in me if it were the truth." Luna replied. "Even though the only reason I am doing any of this is because I was given orders from the reality and fantasy gods of the Dark Sky...and any orders they give out are given to them by the Eternal Three. Are you aware of who the Eternal Three are, Twilight Sparkle?"

Twilight then remembered what K.C. was telling her about Fluttershy being the ruler of the Dark Sky, and her being the other…

"There's a third?" she asked.

"Yes, of course." Luna replied. "The completion of the Trinity, the one whose spirit works through the ruler of the light and the ruler of the dark…"

"K.C…." Twilight thought. "He said that Fluttershy ruled over the world as God...if she's God...then must make me…"

"Let me guess…" Twilight said. "Fluttershy is the ruler of the light…"

Twilight's eyes then turned green as a familiar aura of dark, purple-colored energy began to emanate from them.

"And I'm the ruler of the dark. The only reason I never knew...was because you cast an illusion that tricked my mind."

"Wrong." Luna replied, causing Twilight to perk up a bit, partially believing that maybe she was actually…

"I cast an illusion on your _minds_."

"Fuck off." Twilight cursed in her thoughts.

"So what, I have multiple personalities?" Twilight snarked, angry and disappointed.

"Yes." Luna responded. "However, not in the traditional sense. In your case, you are fully aware that the character you play, the one that's meant to deceive your friends into believing that everything is right as rain when it's not, is a character of your creation even as you play her."

"Pfft, what?" Twilight retorted with a smug grin. "That's not multiple personality disorder. That's just called acting."

"So, you'd call the character you play in front of your friends a fictional one, am I right?" Luna retorted right back with a smug grin of her own.

Twilight's smile of cockiness immediately became a frown of worry.

"No…" she thought. "You fucking bitch…"

"You know as well as I do…" Luna said. "That you want that character you play to be real…your pride won't allow you to ever confess to anyone that she's a creation of your imagination...and do you know what that's done to your mind?"

"You cunt…" she kept thinking, even as she began to hear another voice in her head.

"Don't think such things...you have to be good…"

"She's talking to you right now, isn't she?" Luna continued.

"No, she isn't!" Twilight denied.

"Stop lying to her…" Twilight's other persona told her. "Lying is wrong. Liars go to hell at the end of time…"

"I am not a liar!" Twilight yelled at her persona. "I never lie for myself! I do it to make life easier for everyone, and that just so happens to include me! Even if hell is real, what did I do to deserve it?! And don't you remember what K.C. said? There is no end of time!"

"But who are we to say what we deserve and what we don't deserve?" Twilight's persona argued. "Even if this whole lying thing is irrelevant, are you truly as good as you think you are?"

"It's always that same question…" Twilight replied, feeling weary. "And I always wish to humble myself and say that it is for God to answer, not me...but then...mwa ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha…"

"MWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!" Twilight began laughing maniacally for Luna to hear.

"WHERE IS GOD?!" she bellowed on impulse. "WHERE IS HE?! WHY WON'T HE HELP BREAK WHAT IS BINDING ME?! WHY WON'T HE HELP ME NO MATTER HOW MANY TIMES I PROVE IT TO HIM THAT I CAN'T HANDLE THIS ON MY OWN?! I WANT HIM! SO WHY DOESN'T HE WANT ME?!"

Luna stared at Twilight for a while, watching her pant and try to catch her breath, before saying…

"You say God...do you not mean my sister, Princess Celestia?"

"No, I mean God." Twilight replied. "Princess Celestia...I have graduated from her teachings. I have since then lived as a "god" myself. And yet, I have never understood why God works the way he does."

"You say that as if you actually believe in him…" Luna said with a skeptical look.

"It's very tricky to explain…" Twilight told her. "With my outlook on life, I could very easily be classified as an "atheist nihilist". But I can just never decide...the thought of God will just never abandon my mind no matter how doubtful I become of his existence...and then in turn, that makes me think...what does it mean to "not exist"? To not be present in our reality? But then...how real is our reality in actuality? How can we prove that reality is absolute?"

"Impressive…" Luna responded. "It seems my dream spirits have not slowed down your progress towards discovering the truth as much as I believed initially. I better comprehend now why you were chosen to be the ruler of the dark. You are highly intelligent, open-minded, and thorough in your thinking...and yet despite that, you are indeed inferior to Fluttershy as a god."

"Aww, thanks for the backhanded compliment." Twilight retorted, pretending to do a "cute" voice. "Go on, tell me what makes Fluttershy so much better. No matter what you say, I don't give a fuck. You think this is some contest? You think I care about being the top dog? I want one thing, just one thing. A purpose for living. And I'm not settling for stupid shit like, "OH, IT'S JUST A TEST!" or, "OH, IT'S JUST MEANT TO BE ENJOYED!". No, I want a real reason. I don't care how I was created, I just want to know why!"

"That is something that I can never tell you…" Luna replied as she shut her eyes and knelt her head. "You will find the answer yourself...that is your job. Just like it was my job to impede your progress up until now. More specifically, make things more challenging for you...so that you would be stronger at the end of your journey. This is a journey that will indeed end with you discovering your true purpose...though I warn you, you won't enjoy the results of your shortcomings…"

Twilight's feelings on what Luna had just told her were very mixed. While she was very relieved to learn that she would succeed in discovering her purpose, she was also very mystified by what Luna meant by the "results of her shortcomings"...

"Where did I fall short where Fluttershy succeeded?" Twilight asked curiously. "And don't tell me that she "had faith while I didn't". If you tell me that, I'm just going to laugh."

"Nope," replied Luna, "she certainly did not have the faith you're talking about in that context. She was as agnostic as you."

"What then?" Twilight asked. "I truly am curious...what makes Fluttershy better than me?"

"As a god, I shall explain why." Luna replied. "None are better than anyone. All are created equal. But in measuring abilities, some are indeed greater in certain aspects than others. And Fluttershy's aspect just so happened to be spiritual strength. Spiritual strength that she earned through being humble, honest, caring, courageous, and most of all, devoted. You, by contrast, are arrogant, compulsively dishonest, uncaring, cowardly, and worst of all, complacent."

"Mmhhmm, yeah, fuck me." Twilight said sarcastically. "Fuck Twilight, go Fluttershy. She's just so honest, kind, and pure for tricking me into going to a Satanic party and traumatizing me for life."

"Yes..." Luna responded. "...but it was you who ordered her to do so. Your mortal self may not know, but as a god, you planned this entire thing out with Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord. Everything but one factor...your encounter with Killer Christian. He has caused you to learn the truth sooner than you intended to by forcing you to remember your forgotten past. Originally, you had planned to gradually piece it together through clues given to you at the party."

"So what I'm going through right now is my fault." Twilight remarked nonchalantly. "What does it matter? That doesn't make Fluttershy better."

"The irony truly is stunning…" Luna retorted, squinting her eyes. "You just explained right there why Fluttershy is better. "What does it matter?" That's exactly your problem...you don't truly care."

"..." Twilight was silent this time.

"We both know the truth…" Luna said, her face marked with sorrow. "...the truth that you are so complacent that you would rather give up on your journey to find the answers you desire in favor of remaining miserable for the rest of your existence...and even choose giving up on existing altogether over eternal happiness...simply because it is the easier option of the two."

"..." Twilight was silent for quite a while before she finally responded with…

"Yes, you are right. I admit it. However, am I really so sinful for being complacent in the situation that I'm in? Being that I'm a mortal with no proof or even concrete evidence of anything that I'd like to devote myself to? It's easy for you to judge, because you have always been a god. You, the other gods, and especially God himself have always existed knowing full well the reason why they exist. They could never relate to the problems of mortals such as hopelessness or despair."

"No Twilight," replied Luna, "that is a complete lie. No god, even God himself, has always been a god."

And once again, Twilight was silent. Only this time, the expression on her face in response to hearing this showed that she truly had no idea Luna would ever say such a thing…even Luna, who had said what she had said so boldly, seemed surprised.

The next time Twilight Sparkle spoke, it was not in her ordinary voice...but in a robotic voice.

"FIRST THE SON OF NOIMMAN AND NOW THIS. I AM BEGINNING TO SUSPECT THAT THERE IS A TRAITOR AMONG US."

"Preposterous." Luna refuted. "Any changes made to the story can only be made by those who have been given permission by us gods, and even us gods must have approval for any change we make. It is a process that none can circumvent, even if any of us were to become disloyal."

 _To quote the "golden rule" on story editing from the Awakening project…_

" _If something written in another god's storybook is unapproved, conflicts with what we wrote, or renders something we want to happen impossible to occur, it will not come true."_

Ninja Time God Rarity brought up what Fantasy God Discord had said back then to back up Luna's case.

 _And if you're not satisfied with empirical evidence, how about living proof? Just look at me. When have I ever been the loyal type?_

Fantasy God Discord brought himself up to back up Luna's case.

"THIS IS ALL INFORMATION THAT I HAVE NOT FORGOTTEN," replied Twilight in her robotic voice, "FOR IT IS ETERNALLY STORED WITHIN MY DATABASE. HOWEVER, THERE IS STILL ONLY SO MUCH THAT EVEN WE KNOW ABOUT THIS UNIVERSE. REMEMBER THAT. IN THE MEANTIME, I SHALL LOOK MORE INTO THIS "MASTER" OF "K.C."...AN ISSUE THAT YOU TWO DON'T SEEM TO BE ALL THAT CONCERNED ABOUT..."

 _Because it's nothing to be concerned about? We've explained our case, you know that even if we were to be hiding something, it would change nothing._

Ninja Time God Rarity replied with that.

 _We're untrustworthy, dishonest, and shady characters, we know. But you out of all should know that that isn't the scariest thing about us. The scariest thing about us is that the reason we're like this is for the sake of what should be the truth…_

Fantasy God Discord followed up with that.

"I CAN SEE THE INSPIRATION FOR MY SELF-INSERT." Twilight replied in her robotic voice. "ONE WHO IS WILLING TO ACCEPT AND TELL ALL KINDS OF LIES IF IT MEANS THAT SHE WILL ONE DAY SEE THE TRUTH. BUT UNFORTUNATELY, SHE KNOWS NOT THAT WHAT WE DO ON OUR QUEST FOR THE TRUTH IS WHAT DEFINES US, SHOWS US THE TRUTH OF WHO WE REALLY ARE."

"I tried my best to get her to understand that…" Luna said in a grieved tone. "I never wished to deceive her or anyone, but all must learn the truth for themselves, or else they shall never ascend…"

Luna had a melancholic expression on her face as she began to reminisce.

"Or worse yet," she continued, "end up like me. Ascending to an existence that is naught but eternal torture…"

... _the hell that I created..._

Twilight said those words in her mind as she was suddenly back to being in front of Spike holding Fluttershy's head.

"I know exactly what you mean, Fluttershy." Twilight said in a deadpan voice. "It's me…"


	4. Chapter 4

Episode 4: Never Cry, Maud Pie

"I completely understand now, Fluttershy." Twilight told her friends. "I didn't just create this hell…"

Twilight paused in mid-sentence as her eyes gave a lavender glow.

"I AM THIS HELL." she said in her robotic voice.

Maud Pie, who was still standing by the punch table meditating, opened her eyes and looked over at Twilight and her friends upon hearing those words. It was then that Spike looked at Maud, and using his free hand, gave her a thumbs up. Upon giving her that thumbs up, Maud looked around at what she had been waiting for...the arrival of the demons.

"HA HA HA HA HA!" demons from all around gave an evil laugh.

Even with her newfound realizations, Twilight's instincts still made her afraid as she watched the demons arrive. Dark portals opened up all around the room. Out of them sprawled forth devil ponies with black wings, black, scaled claws on their front legs, and red scales on the rest of their bodies. One portal even appeared above the punch bowl, right behind Maud Pie...

"Gotta love the special access for the V.I.P…" Maud Pie joked as the devil pony coming out of the portal behind her brought its right claw closer to her head… "...it already isn't easy to get all the way over here from the underworld…"

The devil pony then tried to swipe her head off…

...only for Maud to duck, grabbing the punch bowl as she did so. She then took the ladle from the bowl and swung it at the demon pony's hand, knocking it clean off. The demon pony shrieked in agony and retreated into the portal as the claw flew towards Spike, who casually sliced it into pieces with his free hand that emitted a mysterious aura of light. Likewise, a mysterious aura of darkness surrounded Maud as she prepared to finish her joke from earlier…

"...and then you get to have me cover the return trip…"

Maud then unsheathed her sword as Twilight remembered who she was...

"I knew it...she isn't Maud Pie." she thought. "She's that supernatural detective…"

"Get in line everyone...for the ride back to hell." she proclaimed.

Four demon ponies lunged towards Maud from above and tried to stab her with their claws, but Maud rolled to the side to dodge it, taking the punch bowl with her. Having attacked with enough force to puncture the floor, the demon ponies found that their claws were stuck in the floor, rendering them unable to avoid Maud's counterattack, stabbing all four of them at once with a stinger from her sword. All four of the devils exploded in a mess of blood that soon transformed into dark energy. A dark aura glowed around Maud's sword as it absorbed said energy. Watching this, the rest of the demons around the room were terrified. Twilight was also scared and shaking in fright.

"After everything I've thought through…" she said to herself. "Even after all the dark shit that my mind has had to handle...a sight like this has me paralyzed with fear…"

"Don't worry," said Maud, "we've got everything sorted out. Just whatever you do, don't drink the punch…"

It was then that Maud stuck her left back foreleg in the punch bowl and used her right back foreleg to slide herself across the room while in a spinning motion. She pulled out two twin handguns and began firing bullets all around.

"Woo-hoo-hoo." Maud said in her vintage monotone as she did this.

Although the attacks from Maud's guns weren't as powerful as the attacks from her sword, the spreadfire was still enough to kill half of the remaining devil ponies. The ones who were killed fell to the ground and melted into a mess of red blood that turned black as it seeped into the floor, while the surviving demons, who were flying high in the air, became desperate and tried to kill Maud with laser blasts from their fingers. Maud reacted to the assault by shooting the ropes that had held the disembodied pony legs. Having gone past them, she had reached the entrance to Sugarcube Corner, where she stopped sliding. Falling to the ground, the disembodied mass of flesh acted as a shield from the lasers, which blew up the legs and had more blood flying in Maud's direction. Once again, it became dark energy for her sword to absorb. Only now, her sword was growing very bright with this dark energy.

"Yup…" Spike said as he used his free hand to create a bubble of light that encased him, Twilight, and Fluttershy's head, acting as a shield.

Grabbing it with both hooves, she held it back as if she were about to swing a baseball bat. She then uttered another one-liner…

"Any way you slice it, this is going to be a big one…hyah."

Maud made that cry in a dull tone as she swung the sword, causing a giant wave of energy to burst forth from it and slice all the remaining devil ponies in the room to pieces. The force from the wave was so strong that collateral damage resulted from it. The walls around developed several cracks, the picture of the devil that was used for what looked like a knife throwing game was torn, knives were spewn across the floor along with the pizza, and Twilight and her friends, excluding Applejack and Pinkie Pie, were blown back against the wall. Applejack and Pinkie, unfortunately, had their heads sliced to bits, which exploded right in front of Twilight and her remaining friends.

"AAAIIIEEEEE!" Twilight screamed as blood and bits of their brains splattered all over the shield.

"Whoopsie." Spike said with a chuckle. "I forgot to protect them too."

"It's okay, Spike." Fluttershy said to comfort him. "It was an honest mistake."

"YOU GUYS ARE FUCKING INSANE!" Twilight bellowed. "THEY WERE OUR FRIENDS!"

"And they still are." Spike replied. "The only difference is that they're dead now."

"We're just looking on the bright side of this." Fluttershy explained. "At least this gives us an opportunity to save some time. Hey Spike, can you please kill me? Um...if that's okay with you?"

"Sure thing Fluttershy," replied Spike, "it's never any trouble, trust me."

Spike then put his free hand underneath Fluttershy's head, and using that hand like a gun, blasted a laser of swirling light energy that destroyed Fluttershy's head from the inside like a miniature cyclone would. Blood splattered on the faces of Twilight and Spike, traumatizing Twilight even further.

"Talk about a blessing, right?" Spike told Twilight happily. "To be covered in the blood of our savior?"

Twilight didn't say anything. Instead, she began to break down crying.

"UH HU HU HU HUA!" she cried. "WAH HU HU HU HUA!"

Upon witnessing Twilight in tears, Spike actually stopped smiling for once. He saw the pain in the tears she was crying and empathized with her, for he was reminded of when he was living as an ordinary mortal and discovering what lied beyond for the "first time".

"Twilight…" Spike said as he extended his right arm out to Twilight and opened his hand. "Do you...want to go home?"

Twilight turned to him, her tears beginning to cease as she did not feel that this was a trick. However, not feeling fully convinced, she replied with…

"Home? What home? I hope you don't mean the castle. Maybe that's what my brain wants, to just slump back in bed and try to rest, forgetting everything I've seen today. But then what? Then what?! It's not going to change the fact that what I've seen today has scarred me for life, and there's nothing that can be done about that…"

" _If_ ," said Spike, putting emphasis on that word to assure Twilight he was speaking hypothetically, " _if_ , the castle was the place you truly saw as home, I would take you back there in a heartbeat. But since it very much isn't, that's not where we're going. I want to take you home to a place you've wanted to be for a long time...your birthplace. Your _true_ birthplace..."

Twilight jumped slightly, remembering what she was told and shown by K.C. that reminded her about living in a false reality.

"You mean…" she said nervously. "...where I was...artificially created?"

"No," replied Spike, shaking his head, "not even there. I'm taking you to where you were born even before that...the birthplace of all life…and the place that all try to return to when they've lost all hope..."

Twilight's eyes widened, with her getting a feeling about where he was talking about…

"Are you going to teleport us there?" she asked.

"Sort of." Spike responded. "The funny thing is, you don't even need any magic to get there. Even the most untrained mortals could get there without any real effort. Because the fastest way to get there…"

Spike snapped his fingers with his left hand and grabbed Twilight's right foreleg to comfort her as the bubble shield that encased them quickly began to shrink, naturally scaring Twilight as she felt herself become compressed by her closing surroundings.

"...is to die." Spike finished as the shield squished both of them into a bloody pulp.

Both they and the shield disappeared with a popping noise, as an observing Maud gave a nod of acknowledgement. Having pulled her back leg out of the punch bowl, she put her sword away and carried the punch bowl in her right hoof.

"So he's taking her to where I always go…" she said as she walked over to where the pizza was.

All of a sudden, the demon pony who had his claw knocked off earlier jumped in front of Maud and grinded his other claw into some of the pizza that had fallen on the floor.

"HHHIIISSS-" he hissed at her angrily before he was cut off by Maud throwing the punch bowl in his face, and following the throw with a shot from one of her handguns. The bullet that came from the gun destroyed the punch bowl, causing broken shards of glass and the remaining punch in the bowl to fly in the demon's face, along with the bullet that hit him square in the forehead. As the demon fell to the ground dead, blood flying from his face from his fatal wounds, he melted into a mess of red blood that turned black, just as the other slain devils who had fallen on the floor did.

"And where they always go as well…" she continued what she had been saying before she had been interrupted. "...to the darkness."

…..

Blackness. A dark, empty void. That's all Twilight Sparkle could see in front of her right now. Her greatest fear had been realized.

"No…" she said in a mortified tone. "It's true...there really is nothing after death...and I no longer exist…"

After she said that, she began to cry again. But soon, she heard a familiar voice telling her…

"You know, you don't have to sit here and cry by yourself all the time."

"Wha-" Twilight said in surprise as she looked around. "Aaahh…"

Twilight grunted as a bright flash of light appeared. Soon after the light vanished, she was able to see Spike in front of her, as well as her hooves that she brought to her face.

"Sometimes…" Spike told her as he held out his right arm again. "...you can just ask for my hand. You don't always have to wait for me to reach out to you."

Twilight took Spike's hand. After grabbing it with her right hoof, she could see something she couldn't see before. The same way she could see the dark aura surrounding K.C. after he touched her, she could now see an aura of light surrounding Spike. Not only that, but as she looked all around her, she could see stars appearing. Bright stars that made this place look all too familiar…

"It looks like…" Twilight began. "The sky at night..."

"This is much more than just an ordinary night sky though." Spike explained. "Much more than even the night sky that Princess Luna creates. This is what we call Dark Sky. It's a collection of lost worlds that stretches on into infinity…both into the past...and into the future..."

Twilight was once more reminded of what K.C. said about time being endless, and then remembered what Spike said about the "birthplace of all life"...

"So this is where we were all created…" she said. "...and where we go when we die?"

"You catch on quick." Spike replied, regaining his smile. Twilight, on the other hand, regained her fear.

"So we're both dead now?!" she exclaimed.

"Yes." Spike nonchalantly replied. "What's wrong with that?"

"EVERYTHING!" Twilight bellowed. "You KILLED me! Why didn't you just teleport us here?! You didn't have to kill me!"

"Very wrong." Spike responded. "I did, in fact, have to kill you. For you are the kind of mortal who can only conquer their fear of death by dying."

"That makes no sense…" Twilight said in a crestfallen tone. "My life is gone now. Who cares if I overcome my fears? There's nothing left…"

"Again, very wrong." Spike replied. "You say that as if your old life was something you considered invaluable. Now that you've lost it, you have quite the opposite of nothing…"

Spike held his arms up in the air before he continued by saying…

"Just look at this vast, infinite world. You now have everything…"

Twilight took another look around the world of the Dark Sky before she responded to Spike with…

"I just don't see it. It's true that my old life was shit, and maybe it's true that the times I did enjoy it were just me deluding myself, wanting to believe it was good. But there was definitely a time where I was more than happy with my life. A time where I knew for a fact that I enjoyed it every day and loved my friends. Knowing for certain that a time like that existed made my life worth living, because I knew for certain that life could be enjoyed if I could just find the answer to what was troubling me. Every day made me feel like I was closer to discovering the answer. Every day made me feel like I was taking a step closer to getting out of the darkness…"

"When was the time where you enjoyed your life every day?" Spike asked.

Oddly enough, Twilight was silent for a while in response to this question.

"That's strange…" she replied. "I can't seem to remember now. It just feels like it's been so long…"

"Five years ago." Spike said abruptly.

"Huh?" Twilight responded.

"It's been five years, hasn't it?" Spike told her. "But your mind is confused...because it feels like just last night…"

Twilight gasped as something dawned on her.

"Luna's illusion!" she exclaimed.

"Correct," replied Spike, "but not entirely so. Luna's illusion indeed played a significant part in altering your sense of time, but the rest was your doing in your subconscious mind. You wanted your perception of time to be sped up as much as possible to make the times you weren't enjoying shorter. More specifically, the _days_ you weren't enjoying shorter…"

"Oh...oh…" Twilight said nervously, realizing what he was getting at.

"You're acting like you were cherishing every day as a step closer to your goal...when you were helping Luna speed up time...to the point where you can't even remember a single day where you actually did something to help yourself achieve that goal." Spike explained the problem with Twilight's speech of grievance.

"Ugh…" Twilight grunted.

"Think about it," continued Spike, "what progress have you actually made on your own? None. Absolutely none. You can complain all you want about how today has been the worst day of your life after everything that's happened, but that's just the thing. Everything happened. Everything you need to know to discover the truth has happened right before your eyes. We may have had some laughs of our own along the way, but everything we've done has been to help you. To us, this isn't a torture session...it's a counseling session."

"When you said we were dead earlier, you only meant our physical bodies, correct?" Twilight replied. "I'm...not spiritually dead, am I?"

"I can't answer that question." Spike declined a response. "Only you can. You have to ask yourself if you've been dead these past five years or not. All I can vouch for is that I am the one who has killed the old life that you hated. You, on the other hand, are different. You can look at your old life and see what you did on that journey that did define you, but at the same time, you yourself are not the journey."

"..." Twilight kept quiet, meditating on Spike's words as she felt moved by them.

She then looked around at the Dark Sky again, and this time, she asked Spike…

"Can I begin a new journey here...with my friends?"

Spike responded with a smile and a nod.

"Yes, of course you can Twilight." he told her as the souls of Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy surrounded him. "We just need to find Rarity and Rainbow Dash now. And then, you may finally…"

"... _ascend_ …"


	5. Chapter 5

Episode 5: Oblivion and Beyond

 _Tell Princess Celes_ **tia no** …

God is in his heaven. All is right with the world.

Or so mortals "wish" to believe. While Twilight Sparkle was finally facing her struggles head-on in the realm of darkness, the gods up in the realm of light were having issues of their own…

It was in a place that resembled Cloudsdale. A place that, like Cloudsdale, was abundant with white, fluffy clouds hovering the fresh, blue sky. In this place, however, instead of the Weather Factory, there stood a mansion of colossal stature. And that mansion stood in front of a colossal pillar that stretched so high up that the top of it could not be seen. The highest part that was visible was surrounded by a swirling vortex of darkness and light…

On the inside of the mansion, beyond two gold-colored iron gates decorated with the insignia of Fluttershy with the wings of a phoenix praying, was where Princess Luna was trying to reach a compromise with one of the gods she was subservient to...

"Tell her that it wasn't her fault that I ended up this way…" Princess Luna told someone. "Please, let her know that I did this to myself, that in my haste, I-"

"So you want me to tell her what she already knows…" replied a familiar voice. "...is that what you're asking of me?"

"Please," pleaded Luna, "I only wish to relieve some of the pain…"

"But you know as well as I do that without pain, we can not grow stronger." the god replied. "And do you think I have not seen the ineffectiveness of what you have tried to do for Twilight?"

"I know I can not save Twilight from her ultimate destiny…" Luna acknowledged. "But the things I told her...I'm sure they'll mean something to her one day…"

"I do not doubt that." the god responded. "But I do find it interesting how the apparent "traitor" within our midst not only didn't stop you from telling Twilight anything, but also got you to tell her a secret you never intended to spill…"

"Even though I don't have a better explanation myself…" Luna said with a sigh. "I just can't bring myself to believe that one of us is a double agent."

"I wouldn't be able to believe it myself...if I hadn't seen for myself that it's true." the god replied.

Luna's jaw fell slack.

"You jest…" she said in shock.

"It's not just me who knows either." the god continued. "They know as well."

"Rarity and Discord too?!" Luna exclaimed. "But how? And if you've known all this time, why have you not done anything about it?"

"Because we've found a way to work with the "traitor"." the god told her. "Turns out that this "traitor" really hasn't done much to betray us after all. Amongst all of us, I'm sure the only one who would disagree…"

The god then turned to look behind her, outside the back window of the mansion, which looked very similar to The Risen One's home…

"...is her." the god who was revealed to be Fluttershy said as she looked out the window to see the pillar. "My rival, the ruler of the dark…"

Meanwhile, back at Sugarcube Corner...

Maud Pie had returned to meditating. Soon, she began to sense a familiar presence approaching. One that was dark, yet not hostile…

"Yo, Nero." she greeted the presence.

"Ha, ha, ha." the presence laughed in response. "No way to sneak up on you, is there, Myra?"

A shadowy figure rose out of Maud's shadow and presented itself to her.

"Trust me, I am all too familiar with that method of stealth." Maud, who was actually Myra Michaels, replied. "May I ask why you have returned here?"

"Don't be so polite." Nero said. "People least of all expect demonic creatures of hell to feel the urge to always be completely civil."

"But didn't you say that that's exactly what drives you to be as polite as possible?" Myra responded. "To toy with people's expectations?"

"Yeah, but here, it's just you and me." Nero reminded her. "Just two demons hanging out in hell together."

"I'm only half-demon." Myra said. "And personally, I am growing a bit bored of hell."

"Feh." Nero remarked. "I got used to the torture long ago, and I'm still not bored of hell. Ever since my mind was warped by it, I've never been able to escape constantly thinking about new ways to experience excruciating pain. I truly am a full-on masochist now…"

"You poor thing." Myra said out of sympathy. "I genuinely feel more sorry for you than Twilight even. At least the reason we were created was for a good cause. At least we have friends..."

"What are you talking about?" Nero asked her. "You don't consider me a true friend?"

"I consider you a true friend," answered Myra, "the problem is that you don't."

"Ha ha ha!" Nero laughed again. "Yeah, you can see right through me, good job. I don't trust anyone. Not my closest allies, not even myself. I like you, don't get me wrong. It's just my nature. After what I've been through, no matter how close anyone gets to me, no matter how much I feel that their intentions are pure, I can never shake the feeling of doubt in the back of my mind that one day, they're going to betray me."

"Yeah," replied Myra, "I used to be the exact same way."

"Before you had a change of heart upon meeting a special friend?" Nero taunted with a smug grin on his face.

"It didn't come down to something as simple as him being worthy of my trust." Myra replied, having memories of her first time meeting a priest dressed in a white robe that carried a mysterious staff with him. "The demon inside of me knew that there existed people in the world who were trustworthy, but that it mattered not, for even those kinds of people would not accept someone like me. An abominable murderer who had spared none her wrath."

Nero's smile started to fade as he heard this.

"As I talked to this friend of mine about what I had done and watched how he responded to what I said is when I started to realize something…" Myra continued. "I wasn't looking for someone to trust...I was looking for someone to trust me."

"...Spira." Nero eventually said.

"Hmm?" Myra went in response.

"I do have someone in my life who's like that friend of yours." Nero told her. "Her name is Spira. She's my sister."

"Noimman had another child?" Myra asked.

"No," replied Nero, "I'm Noimman's son, she's Fluttershy's daughter. It's difficult to explain, but what makes us siblings is that we both share the same earth mother, Terra. The gods who created our souls on the other hand, are different."

"I see." Myra said. "So what is Spira like?"

"...She's like a light." Nero replied. "A light that I need to have. Whenever I'm with her, I feel like I'm with God...or at least what I hope God is like."

"That's a very strong opinion you have of her." Myra commented. "Why is that you have difficulty trusting others after you've been around someone like that?"

In response to that, Nero began crying on impulse.

"My mother told me the story of how Twilight became who she was…" he explained. "...she was betrayed...by the last one she ever suspected would betray her…"

"I'm sorry…" Myra told him out of sympathy. "But the one who betrayed her is not the only one at fault for Twilight being the way she is. The one who is ultimately responsible for Twilight being the way she is is Twilight…"

As Myra said that, Twilight was seen stepping out of a dark portal and setting foot on a cloud.

"Twilight has made a fatal mistake…" Myra continued. "...in trying to change things for the better...without first changing herself for the better…"

It was revealed that Twilight Sparkle had just set foot in Cloudsdale, or at least in the place that appeared to be Cloudsdale. As she looked out over the area, she could see Fluttershy's mansion and the gargantuan tower that laid ahead of it. Looking upon the tower, her eyes gave that same lavender glow...

Flying closer to the mansion and landing on the clouds before the doors, she could see a gang of familiar faces. Standing outside the mansion were the members of the Dark Sky, Dumb-bell, Hoops, Score, Ghost Rainbow Dash, and Derpy Hooves.

"Well, well, well." Dumb-bell said with a cocky grin as he and the others saw Twilight.

"It's our old boss, Boss!" Hoops exclaimed as the gang laughed.

"...Boss?" Twilight replied, giving them a look of confusion.

"..." Score silently explained the experiences Twilight and their gang shared together in the past.

"I'm sorry," said Twilight, "I don't speak silent language."

"Oh, don't joss with us!" Ghost Rainbow Dash retorted. "You know what happened during the Awakening project! You kept us working nonstop in the machine! You forced us to riff your shitty story!"

"And it wasn't very fun!" Derpy interjected. "Too much talking and never any naptimes!"

"Um...that was wrong of me, and I'm very sorry." Twilight decided to apologize, going along with it even though she didn't understand it, not wanting to argue with insanity anymore.

"Hey, it's all good, ja?" Dumb-bell replied. "That kind of thing happens all the time in big companies."

"Yeah," said Hoops, "if Starcatch was a company, it would've been the biggest company the world had ever seen. How would anyone not be able to expect any kind of corruption in a place like that?"

Twilight got the lavender glow in her eyes yet again as she felt a sense of deja vu.

"Wait…" Twilight said in her mind as she looked over at the enormous tower again. "They couldn't possibly be talking about...holy shit…"

"Glad everyone except Derpy loved it!" she remembered herself saying.

"So that's it…" she told herself in her thoughts. "I should've known…"

"I'm part of that building, aren't I?" Twilight asked the Dark Sky members as she looked back over at them. "Starcatch is my true form, isn't it?"

"You were also a guy named Noava who killed Fluttershy or something like that," replied G.R.D., "but yeah, that's essentially the gist of it."

"I should've known…" Twilight repeated to herself in her mind. "I have done things to deserve this suffering...and I must come back to God to repent of my sins…"

"You have told yourself this before many times…" Twilight's other persona said to her. "But no matter how often you say it, you never become any more humble…"

"Then I finally shall become more humble as I finally put my words into practice…" Twilight replied to the voice in her mind. "I shall go to God personally and humble myself in his sight as I ask for his forgiveness. I will hear what he commands me to do and act in full accordance, for I have decided that this is the day where I will finally change my life…"

Upon Twilight saying that, everything went black and a bolt of lightning came down…

"It's time…" Fluttershy said, still inside of her mansion with Luna. "Come with me…"

As the gates to the mansion opened up, Twilight felt a light shining upon her, giving her a feeling of warmth and comfort that she had not felt anywhere else before. Surely, this was the day where everything would…

"Ha ha ha ha ha!" the Dark Sky members laughed.

"What's so funny?" Twilight asked them angrily.

"Oh, I think you know…" G.R.D. retorted. "...that the "righteous soul being led astray from the path of good only to return to it after having an epiphany that allows them to become strong enough to earn heaven" is a cliche that is only found in power fantasy tales…"

"Rude…" Twilight remarked, shooting her a stern look.

"Sorry," apologized G.R.D., to Twilight's surprise, "maybe that was too snide. Though I only mean to be cruel to be kind, I think a song will get the message across better, even if it's more like a poem…blame Derpy for losing our instruments..."

"I just don't know where I last put them…" Derpy said sadly.

"Like it matters." Dumb-bell commented. "The most important instruments of all are the strings of your heart."

"If you can learn how to tug those, you can play a tune for anyone." Hoops said.

"..." Score silently interjected.

"And as Score just demonstrated…" G.R.D. said. "Words themselves are an instrument."

It was then that the song began…

 _The tower to heaven, From five to seven_

 _Always changes its parts_

 _The one who transcended it, they never ended it_

 _They always give it new starts_

 _A new path they opened, for all of the chosen_

 _Orbs symbolized light and dark_

 _Then with a(nother) murder mystery, the trial was blistering_

 _The story was given many ends_

 _But even with much closure, it will never be over_

 _Even if the killer makes amends_

 _Where we go, it doesn't matter how far_

 _For everything has already been decided by the star_

With that, the poem concluded. The only reaction it got out of Twilight, however, was an unconvinced look followed by an unenthusiastic remark…

"Let me guess...you're trying to dissuade me from going to meet Fluttershy and apologize to her...because you find it to be meaningless?"

"We wish it was meaningless." the Dark Sky members replied. "If you go in there right now, you'll regret it for all eternity."

"Don't be ridiculous." Twilight said. "Right now, I'm going through a problem that requires urgent attention. And up until now, I only treated it as a backburner concern. After I've been shown a golden opportunity to fix the problem, how can I ignore such a chance? Besides, it's my funeral, not yours."

"Very wrong," retorted the Dark Sky members, "as the guy who led you here liked to say. It's going to be _everyone's_ funeral."

"...You know who Spike really is too?" Twilight asked.

"In the context of what you mean, yes." the Dark Sky members replied. "In all honestly, no one really and truly knows who Spike is. He's an honest-to-goodness enigma, if that makes any sense. The only surety about him is that's nothing we know about him is certain."

"You wouldn't go so far to say that he's set me up, would you?" Twilight asked.

"No," answered the Dark Sky members, "you yourself should know by now who the traitor is…"

"IS THAT A QUESTION FOR ME?" Twilight's robot persona replied.

"So even we know something you don't, "Boss", ha ha…" they teased.

"TELL ME WHO IT IS." Twilight's robot persona commanded. "THAT'S AN ORDER."

"Sorry," they replied, "but your boss ordered us not to tell you."

"YOU MEAN FLUTTERSHY?" she asked. "BUT SHOULDN'T THE IDENTITY OF THE TRAITOR BE AN IMMEDIATE CONCERN TO ALL OF US?"

"If you want immediate answers, you should try your best to wring them out of Fluttershy." they retorted. "But if you want answers that will truly mean something now and forever, you should try your best to wring them out of yourself. The only problem is that in the state you're in now, all "yourself" is going to tell you is a load of bullshit."

"YOU REMIND ME OF LUNA." Twilight's robot persona told them. "HONESTLY, I DON'T REALLY CARE WHAT ANYONE BESIDES FLUTTERSHY THINKS. THIS CONVERSATION IS OVER. GOODBYE."

And with that, Twilight walked through the entrance to Fluttershy's mansion, the gates shutting behind her as the Dark Sky members chuckled to themselves.

"What a fucking liar." they thought to themselves. "You only care what you think. But whatever, enjoy getting the last word. Then see how much it helps you...in hell."

Twilight walked through the courtyard of the mansion, coming closer to the house. Though she had expected to see Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord standing outside the house, she instead saw Luna and Fluttershy…

"Yo." Fluttershy unceremoniously greeted Twilight. "What's up?"

"?!" Twilight went, unable to comprehend any reason as to why Fluttershy was being so casual. Luna shared her confusion too, as she looked over at Fluttershy in astonishment just as Twilight did.

"Um...I'm doing fine…" Twilight answered Fluttershy, bowing her head in reverence, deciding not to question what she found weird once again. "I just came here to ask you something…"

"Ask me everything if you want." Fluttershy replied as she pulled out a book and pen. "After all, didn't you come here believing that I would give you the answers to all of your problems?"

"No, no, that's fine…" Twilight politely declined. "I only need a little help from you…"

"Completely wrong." Fluttershy replied. "You need every bit of help you can get from me. Can you admit that to me?"

"Yes, of course." Twilight lied. "I'll tell you all of my problems, I promise."

As Twilight told Fluttershy everything that she thought was wrong with her, Luna felt weird the entire time.

"I can feel that Twilight has changed in some ways…" Luna thought. "She is self-aware of her problems now, for sure, and I can see that her drive to fix them is true, but...something is still deeply wrong with her soul…"

"Fluttershy…" she kept thinking as she looked over at Fluttershy, filling page after page of the book as she wrote in it with her pen. "What ever are you writing in there?"

Eventually, Twilight was finished sharing all her problems with Fluttershy, and Fluttershy was finished writing.

"And that's it." Twilight concluded. "That's everything. That's every question I have for you. Now please show me the answers."

"Certainly." Fluttershy said sweetly, handing Twilight the book she finished.

"Thank you so much." Twilight said, feeling honestly grateful. "I'm sorry for everything that I've done. Thank you for finding me worthy of your forgiveness…"

Looking at the book, she told herself in her mind…

"Finally. It's finally come to an end. My long walk of suffering is finally over. Now that God has given me this book, I can turn everything around. In the end, all I had to do was humble myself before God and have him show me the way…this truly is the perfect ending to the story of Twilight Sparkle..."

 _The End of the Story of Twilight Sparkle._

"Up next is my story," said Myra Michaels, "which ties in with this one. It may seem somewhat abrupt, but you'll see how the two come together…

...right now."

Right now, Twilight Sparkle was staring at the book in horror. She had opened it and started reading it, only to find…

...nothing. All the pages in the book were blank.

Twilight then looked at Fluttershy and asked…

"But...how? I saw you write words in this book…"

"Who said I was writing words in the book?" Fluttershy replied. "All I was writing in there was a magical incantation. Symbols that faded away."

"You were...casting a spell on it?" Twilight surmised. "But what kind of spell?"

Twilight looked all throughout the book, flipping page after page frantically.

"Come on, this has to be a fucking joke!" she exclaimed in frustration in her mind, pressing her face up against the book in desperation. "There have to be words in here some...where…"

Twilight paused in worry when she realized that she was no longer facing the book...but her own body. Her face was now on a page in the book, staring at her own faceless body…

"EEEEEKKKKK!" she shrieked in terror as her faceless body brought her hooves to where her face used to be. "What...why…"

"Don't you understand?" Fluttershy said as Twilight's faceless body tried to pick her face up, but failed, as her face was fused with the book. "There are no words in that book that I have written. You are one of the many who will search and search for them futily, then give up deciding to just make your own interpretation of the book. You attach your face to the book and sacrifice your individuality, thinking that it's giving the book magic, without ever realizing that I am the only one who can give that book magic. And so, instead of finding me..."

Twilight then tried to teleport her face back onto her body with her magic, only for the spell to backfire. A magic aura appeared around her before she vanished and reappeared as a drawing in the book.

"You find yourself sucked inside your own little story." Fluttershy jeered.

Watching this, Luna was aghast.

"Fluttershy, what are you doing?!" Luna shouted. "You-you didn't do this to me as punishment for denying your grace!"

"This is not punishment, Luna." Fluttershy replied. "This is simply cause and effect. Twilight Sparkle wishes to go to hell, and so, she will go to hell."

Fluttershy then grabbed the book and shut it before it became surrounded by an ever-consuming fire. Though blocked by the cover, Twilight's face made a futile attempt at escaping the book, hollering in agony as the book turned to ash. Fluttershy then scooped up the ashes, the story that Twilight had become, and whispered something to her…

"I wish you luck in finding out who the traitor is, Satan…"

And with that, she scattered the ashes as Luna just stood back and watched in disbelief. The only words of comfort she received from Fluttershy that day were these…

"Don't worry. I'm hoping that she'll return one day as a phoenix, just like Myra did. Even if she first has to return here as the devil."

 _Twilight's spirit has moved on..._


	6. Chapter 6

Episode 6: The Demon and the Phoenix

Once again, Twilight Sparkle found herself surrounded in darkness, asking herself questions…

"How could she send me to hell? I'm already in hell...I am hell…"

"Everyone is already in hell before they are "sent there", Twilight." someone told Twilight in her mind. "What God expects of us is to come to him with a contrite heart, to be completely sincere in a promise to change ourselves. Those who instead come to him while they are still yet to put aside their arrogance and selfish ambition are not yet worthy to come out of hell."

"Wait, not _yet_?" Twilight replied, her heart jumping at that glimmer of hope. "Does that mean that I can still…"

"Yes…" the one speaking to Twilight replied. "Unfortunately, you have a very long way to go…"

"I don't care!" Twilight exclaimed. "No matter how much work I have to do to get out of here, I'm willing to do it!"

"Though your passion is admirable," remarked the one talking to Twilight in her mind, "this comes down to more than just conquering your slothfulness and complacency now."

"Is it my arrogance then?" Twilight replied. "Fine, I'll knock my swelled head down till it's flat. If it's cowardice, I'll throw myself up against a horde of ravenous beasts. If it's selfish ambition, there goes my dream of becoming a lawyer! I'm dead fucking serious, I will literally do anything if it means finally getting out of here!"

"I can very much tell that you are completely serious…" the one in Twilight's mind replied. "...I personally would defend you wanting to become a lawyer...but all these vices that you're willing to shun are only extensions of your inner darkness...the greatest evil that lies within you is by far your hatred…"

"...You're right." Twilight admitted. "I'm always looking at all this hate I have bottled up inside of me and just trying to find a way to get rid of it...to replace it with love…"

"Your intention is noble…" the one in Twilight's mind remarked. "...but alas, that was exactly what led you to make another fatal mistake...trying to get rid of the hatred in secrecy instead of fighting it and overcoming it…that mistake is what created the devil gods..."

"The devil gods?" Twilight asked.

"Yes," replied the one in Twilight's mind, "Celes, Akame, and Noimman. Though Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord had a part in creating Celes and Akame, whom were both originally human women, Noimman was born purely from your hatred. With the help of the ruler of the universe, your robot self created a creature of ultimate evil...the greatest terror the world has seen yet…"

"Of all the things I know for sure are an exaggeration…" an unconvinced Twilight thought.

"But why would I do something like that?" Twilight asked. "More importantly, why would the ruler of the universe do something like that?"

"You did it because you were desperate," explained the one in Twilight's mind, "and it is part of your duty as the ruler of the dark to always be finding new ways to prune the new generation. I am not sure of what the ruler of the universe's motives were, but I have a feeling that he had similar thoughts as you. Suffering is needed for us to grow, something that even Fluttershy, the ruler of light agrees upon..."

"That poor kid though…" Twilight said with a tone of remorse as she remembered K.C.. "What was it like for him to be the son of Noimman?"

"It's a most horrifying tale…" the one in Twilight's mind replied. "...but I will tell it to you later. Right now, I must tell you the story of Myra Micheals…"

"Why wait?" Twilight asked. "I want to know now. I want to know how my actions hurt others as soon as possible so I can correct my behavior as soon as possible…"

"In the state you are in right now Twilight, it would change nothing if you learned about how you hurt him." the one in Twilight's mind said. "In fact, it would likely make things worse. Knowing just how great the evil that festers inside of you truly is right now would probably cause you to lose hope in yourself altogether."

"...It's that bad?" Twilight replied, starting to worry more. "I lost some hope in myself just from you telling me that."

"Do you see my point?" the one in Twilight's mind told her. "I can't give you everything in one sitting. You can't train someone to lift their entire body upside-down and stand with just one arm without first training them to stand with two."

"But where does Myra play into this?" Twilight asked. "I know about what she did at the party, but how does her story relate to mine?"

"You'll find out soon enough…" the one in Twilight's mind replied. "You'll probably be surprised to know of the similarities you and Myra possess."

"Your robot self should already know this from the Awakening project, but to get your mortal self up to speed, Myra Micheals was once a widely feared serial killer who possessed demonic power. She would cut off the penises of all her male victims and devour their testicles. According to rumors, she had gathered enough at one point to build herself a miniature house."

"That's revolting…" a disgusted Twilight replied.

However, Twilight also thought to herself…

"Glad I have a legitimate reason to hate her now though…"

"Don't say that." Twilight's other persona told her. "We shouldn't be hating anyone for what they did in the past."

"I know." the one telling Myra's story said. "Only hearing that part of the story, anyone would initially assume that Myra was an evil monster."

"Doh…" Twilight thought. "Still, anyone who would _ever_ do something that terrible at any point…"

"Even comrades of hers meeting her for the first time would assume such a thing to be true in the past. But truth be told, even back then, Myra did not have a desire for evil."

"You've gotta be kidding me!" Twilight exclaimed in her mind. "How the fuck is that possible?!"

"This is the problem you have, Twilight." Twilight's other persona said to her. "You can't let your negative emotions give you a bias when hearing things like this. Why do you think you weren't ready to face Fluttershy? It doesn't matter if you listen to someone like you have an open mind if your heart isn't open."

The one telling Myra's story began to chuckle.

"I can hear what you're thinking…" she said playfully. "You should be catching on by now as to what I'm trying to do…"

"Huh?" Twilight responded.

"Trials and tribulations are everywhere, Twilight…" the storyteller told her in a foreboding tone of voice. "God is always looking to test you, even after you've passed the test of Satan, and the test of mine..."

"Odd…" Twilight thought, not caring that the storyteller could hear. "Fluttershy called me Satan...could I be...and if I've already passed this one's test...could she be…?"

"Continuing on…" the storyteller continued. "Myra did not have an inherent lust to do evil. When she was only a sweet young girl of five years old, she was used for an experiment that involved infusing a human with a demon's soul. Like you may already figure, things went awry. Myra ended up murdering her family, her classmates, and many more innocent civilians in what seemed like a neverending cycle of calamity...can you imagine what that must have been like for her? Being torn from her innocence, all of her happiness, and all of her loved ones in such a way?"

"..." Twilight remained silent, both in her speech and in her thoughts out of respect.

"I know you two didn't get along," said the storyteller, "and I'm not even asking you to do nothing but sympathize with her, for she still committed the sin of submitting to the evil. But honestly ask yourself, would you have been different if you were in a position like that?"

"...I probably would have been worse." Twilight humbly answered. "But tell me more, what in the fucking world was the logic behind this experiment? Who would conduct such a thing on a little girl and why?"

"It will make much more sense when you learn more about Myra's world," replied the storyteller, "but I'll explain one thing for the time being that it was an attempt to bring demons and humans together while also infusing human beings with an unstoppable power. It is not just in Myra's world, you will come to find, but also in the worlds of Adrian Bruce and Nero that people have discovered a way to achieve this power through the fusion of Yin and Yang."

"...What about in my world?" Twilight asked, something dawning on her as she began to draw parallels with her being the ruler of darkness and Fluttershy being the ruler of light.

"That'll be for you to find out when the time comes…" the storyteller replied in an ominous tone of voice. "Anyways, I feel I have provided you with enough backstory. I think it's time for you to actually step into the shoes of the victor from the dark domain."

"What do you mean by that?" Twilight asked, having grown comfortable with consistently having to ask this question.

"What I mean is that I can not just tell you Myra's story in order for you to truly grasp what you must learn." the storyteller explained. "I must also have you live it…"

"How can I do that?" Twilight replied.

"You've already lived two parts of Myra's story." the storyteller said. "One was when you were sent here by Fluttershy, and the other was when you went to the world of darkness for the first time. Drawing patterns on this one yet, Satan?"

"...Oh." Twilight said, realizing the connection. "If I'm the ruler of the darkness…"

"Then you now have the power to see inside the hearts of those who have fallen into hell." the storyteller finished for her. "It's an ability you'll quickly find to be a very easy thing to do. All you have to do is close your eyes, relax, and attempt to feel the vibrations of her soul like you would your own…"

Twilight, as usual, was not fully convinced. Nevertheless, she complied…

"Remember that this is not unfamiliar territory you are stepping into." the storyteller told her. "You have already lived as her in this world. And now…"

"...you shall become her in another…"

A flood of light filled Twilight Sparkle's mind and a voice echoed inside. It was the voice of Fluttershy saying…

"You know who you really are…"

 _I will not allow this…_

"Myra…" a young man said. "Please listen to me. You must not go to fight him."

The man, who had white hair with black streaks in it, was a surprisingly youthful high priest who wore a white robe and held beside him a white staff. The handle of the staff was an emblem of a man praying while holding a ball of light in his cupped hands, and engraved on the rod was the writing, "L…". He and Myra, who had black hair, was dressed in a black garb, and had her sword sheathed at her side, were sitting together in a large tent.

"Forgive me…" Myra told him remorsefully. "But I must disobey your orders. I will not allow this village to pay for the crimes I have committed."

"I know you mean to tell it to me kindly while expressing what you honestly feel," replied the priest, "which is commendable, but I also know that you are not telling me everything. I know that you believe that if Nick Rohn were to send his soldiers to this village and arrest you, we would not have the strength to resist them."

"Please don't take it the wrong way." Myra said. "I know that you're strong. Stronger than any demon. But these are not demons whom we face. These are the warriors whom are considered by the world to be its saviours. If this village ends up on Phoenext's blacklist because of me, I don't know what I'll do. I don't see anything else I can do here besides turn myself in right away."

"Overestimating the limit of our options…" the priest said. "Such a common mistake. You have learned much since the time when you believed that killing was the only way, and yet, there are still roots from that time you have not begun to abandon..."

"Don't forget that you're the one who taught me that skyscrapers aren't built in one day by one person." Myra remarked. "Not only that, but the plans for any kind of creation are complex and interchangeable. A conservative mindset can not lead such a massive project, much less chart a new course for the world. We must always be willing to adapt to accommodate unexpected changes made by the unforeseen, even if that means taking risks."

"Yes, that is very true." the priest replied. "The world does demand such an attitude. But while we are part of the world Myra, we mustn't forget that we are not part of its evil. Thus, we must not use such ideologies as justification for committing sin."

"What I am doing now is not a sin…" Myra retorted, beginning to grow frustrated. "Yes, I admit it. Selfishly, I do want to defeat Nick with my own strength and satisfy my pride. So? It doesn't change the fact that I'll be doing something good by protecting you and your loved ones."

"Very true," replied the priest, "but remember the reason why I took you in. It was because I did not look at what you had done, but you…I was able to overlook your actions of the past because I saw that the real you was not a murderer...would you mean to tell me that when you came to me that day willing to change, that you did it with the desire to satiate your pride?"

Myra paused, slightly opening her mouth in surprise as she felt an odd vibration run through her body.

"Loki…" she called the priest by his name. "I feel…"

"You're allowed to feel however you feel." Loki replied. "I've said everything I've said knowing that I can not change your mind. I am only your guide. I must not be remiss in my duty as your mentor, but you must decide for yourself what is right. Even if that means first finding out what is wrong the hard way…"

Myra snapped back to how she was before and shut her eyes and mouth.

"Fine." she said bluntly as she stood up. "If that is how it must be, I shall accept it. After all, I came here desiring to pay penance for my sins of the past. You've made the way easy for me up until now. Though I have to thank you for that, I must say that I have been craving a challenge recently…"

Myra then made her way out of the tent.

"Goodbye." she said as she left. "I will be coming back…"

Loki did not say anything more to Myra, allowing her to have the last word. He did, however, say something to himself in his thoughts as Myra made her way out of the village.

"Every bird must one day leave its nest…" he began saying to himself as Myra was now walking outside the village.

"Confronting its fears before it spreads its wings and flies…" he said as Myra had now stopped walking, gathering a dark aura around her body before she sprouted a pair of black demon wings from her back and began flying.

"It then begins searching for a new place to call home, having set its goals high…" he continued as Myra laid eyes on a massive skyscraper that was adorned with the letters "PHOENEXT".

"But the bird knows of the many dangers of the world that may clip its wings and return it to ashes…" he said as Myra landed on top of the building to see a black-haired man dressed in a blue business suit with a red tie and a white shirt. In his right hand, he was holding a red gun with white stripes on it that had the words "He Lives Forever" engraved on it.

"Even so, the bird has faith that the fire inside it shall live on…" he finished as Myra brandished her sword, prepared to do battle…


	7. Chapter 7

Episode 7: Eternal Fire or Eternal Darkness

Twilight Sparkle was still in the darkness, asking herself questions…

"Isn't the answer obvious?" she said. "I mean, I'm in darkness right now, not fire…"

"That's how you're viewing it at the moment, yes." the storyteller told her. "Have you ever in your life viewed it as anything different?"

"When I was little, yeah." Twilight replied with a chuckle. "Like every little kid who heard the stories about it, I was frightened out of my wits over the idea of being in fire forever. As I got older though, I realized how stupid that was. Burning forever for doing bad things on earth for less than a century...get out of here. Besides, anyone would get used to the pain of the heat eventually."

"Such thinking is logically correct." the storyteller said. "We're all just lumps of meat and when we die, we all rot equally...did you ever believe that?"

"I never _wanted_ to believe that." Twilight responded. "But at a time where the ideas of heaven and hell were starting to become ludicrous to me, I just didn't see what else to believe in. Reincarnation sounded nice, but as someone who was of science, it made me feel out of place to believe in something like that in a world that wouldn't stop showing me evidence that living creatures just live their lives and die. Even being where I am now, it's just all so muddled and mixed up…I still feel trapped inside of a vortex of not knowing what to believe just thinking about it..."

"Heh heh." the storyteller chuckled. "I bet what makes it even more confusing is that Tartarus is real."

"Ha ha, that hell is different from what we're talking about." Twilight retorted. "Back on the subject, I still don't see the room for debate. I saw those demons that were killed by Myra melt away into darkness. When I was killed by Spike, I went to the Dark Sky. When I was killed by Fluttershy, I went...here…"

Twilight then remembered that she ended up here after Fluttershy trapped her in a book and incinerated it…while Luna was there...

"Oh fuck…" she swore as she looked over at the storyteller, who was laughing. "Don't tell me…"

"My faithful student…" the storyteller said in a creepy tone of voice as she stretched a familiar white hoof out at her. "It is time for you to be baptized…"

Twilight felt a burning sensation as the white hoof was pressed up to her forehead and something became very clear to her as her mind assessed the pain…

"The pain…" she thought. "The pain I've felt that has never gone away...I want to escape from it...I want to go back to Myra's story…"

Twilight tried to close her eyes, relax, and feel the vibrations like she had done before, but it was difficult with the unrelenting pain she was feeling with the storyteller's flaming hoof pressing against her forehead harder and harder…

"It's no use…" she thought. "The pain is too much...but how? It's only physical pain. How can I still be so susceptible to physical pain after all the mental and spiritual pain I've been forced to endure? Every day...every hour...every...moment…"

Twilight gasped as she came to realize what the test here was…

"Do you understand now, my faithful student?" the storyteller asked. "The purpose of the fire?"

"Yes, I understand perfectly." Twilight replied. "The fire is the pain that reminds us of where we are. Without it, we would grow completely numb to our mental suffering and slip into a stupor. It keeps us awake...it keeps reminding us that the false comfort our depressed minds have given us makes us complacent and weak. Just like how if it were not for the pain of our mortal bodies, we wouldn't know that we were sick, if it were not for this fire that is constantly agonizing our spirits, we wouldn't know that we were of the damned..."

"Precisely…" the storyteller told her. "You would fall asleep in darkness forever without it…wonderful work. Just what I expect from my most faithful student of all, Twilight Sparkle. Though you're not exactly my student anymore, but the princess of friendship. In fact, not exactly a princess of friendship anymore, but a prince of darkness...from princess to prince...my sister had a similar upbringing..."

"You don't have to try to make it as obvious as possible…" Twilight said with a disgruntled sigh. "I know who you are now."

"But do you really?" the storyteller retorted as she stepped out of the darkness, revealing herself to be one who resembled Princess Celestia. "After all the deception you've witnessed, are you still adamant in believing that all is not what it seems while not truly believing in anything?"

"Hmph." Twilight scoffed. "I'm already open to the possibility that you're not really Celestia. But I truly believe in one thing. That you are my guide and what you teach me will be pivotal in my quest to earn heaven."

"Don't you mean escape from hell?" Celestia asked, giving her a sinister smirk.

"Heh heh heh…" Twilight responded with a sinister laugh. "Tell me your story...how you ended up down here…"

"After I tell you Myra's story…" Celestia replied. "I'm sure you'll be able to relax perfectly fine this time as you attempt to enter her world again, even as I cook you…"

True to what Celestia said, Twilight was able to lay down, relax, and feel the vibrations of Myra's soul easily, even as Celestia used her magic to light Twilight on fire…

 _I don't fear it anymore…_

"I don't fear it anymore, Nick." Myra told Nick Rohn as he pointed his gun at where her heart was located. "I am no longer afraid of death…"

"Because of your arrogance?" Nick replied. "Most people who don't fear death have lost fear of it out of hate for their lives, disbelief that they will have to pay penance for their wrongs at the end, and self-deceit of their fragility and the brevity of their lives. Sometimes it's just one of the three, but knowing your track record, I'd say it's all of the above."

"I'm sorry to break it to you," retorted Myra, "but it's none of the above. I'm not here because I want to die, I already am seeking to atone for my sins, and I have told myself no lies. I'm here because you asked me to come here. That's all."

"So you mean to tell me that you would've showed up even if the fate of your village wasn't at stake?" Nick mocked. "There are no unsolved issues of the past that you wish to resolve today? You really just came because you felt like it?"

"What I mean to say…" Myra said, giving Nick an icy glare. "Is that I'm not here because you intimidated me by putting out an order for my execution and the burning of my village if it took part in harboring me. I don't care whether I'm quietly disposed of in the slums or sent out in a blaze of glory here. I just want to fight you…"

"And that's really it?" Nick asked, still unconvinced. "This has nothing to do with anything that has ever happened between us? You simply forgot that you were the one who killed my parents?"

"So this is about revenge?" Myra replied.

"Not really." Nick answered. "The prospect of taking vengeance for my fallen "loved ones" does not particularly interest me. My interest lies in the future of my company, but even more importantly, the future of my world. My dream is for the people of the world to be able to live in peace, without ever having to worry about demons like you robbing them of their lives on sudden notice."

"...You know that I never wanted to be a demon." Myra said. "I want exactly the same thing as you. A world where we don't have to be afraid of the devils. But persecuting me and others who wish to escape from the darkness is not going to get you any closer to that goal."

"Myra…" Nick replied, his voice dreary and cold. "...you know as well as I do that there is no escape from the darkness…"

Upon hearing that, Myra felt another vibration run through her, just as she had when she was talking to Loki earlier.

Nick then held his arms out as he looked up to the sky.

"Look at me…" he told her. "Look at where I stand now. All this recognition, all this fortune I hold in a world that I practically rule as a god...and do you think I'm any happier than I was the day when I learned that my entire future was planned out for me?"

Myra then had a flashback to when she was looking at a younger, emotionless Nick, who had just stepped into the kitchen to see Myra standing over the corpses of his parents.

"...When I saw him that day, he looked like he wanted to cry…" Myra thought. "But not for the reason a child normally would upon viewing such a scene…"

Myra then noticed that Nick was now returning the icy glare she gave him earlier as he gripped his gun…

"Have our roles reversed?" she asked herself.

"No matter how I feel…" Nick said solemnly. "It won't change the fact that the fate you will meet today won't be decided by me, but by the ones above whom you have gone against. And I know that killing you won't make me any happier, for it is not you who has ruined me, but a collection of things that just so happened to include you as a factor that has ruined me. Nevertheless, it is still my god-given duty to deliver justice upon you this day…"

"..." Myra was silent as she got into her battle stance.

"That's right, no more words…" Nick continued. "I don't need to keep telling you that it's not me you're fighting against...but your destiny…"

Nick then fired a flaming bullet from his gun at Myra, who deflected it away with a swing of her sword. Myra then swiftly moved to the right to circle around to the edge of the tower where Nick was. Nick then fired another bullet towards where Myra was running. The bullet missed as Myra moved past it, running towards Nick with the speed of a superhuman. She jumped in the air, and was about to swing her sword at Nick, when all of a sudden…

"?!" Myra stopped in mid-air as her sixth sense commanded her to look behind her and see that the bullet that had missed her earlier was now flying towards her.

Immediately, Myra turned around and smacked the bullet away with a stroke of her sword, but was left vulnerable to a melee attack by Nick, who used his free hand to karate chop Myra in the chest, knocking her down to the ground. Nick then stepped on her chest and pointed the gun at her head.

"Bang." he said, beginning to push harder on her chest with his foot. "If this was an ordinary battle, I'd already be the victor. I'd like to keep this fight going for as long as it should, but even prisoners on death row have their rights."

"Agh...uh...ngah…" Myra was grunting in pain that was growing more and more from the pressure being put on her chest.

"I can end the pain now if you want…" Nick offered. "Just say mercy."

"No…" she replied. "I don't care if I'm not as strong as you...I'm seeing this out until the end…"

"Ha!" Nick scoffed as he kept smothering his foot on her chest. "I knew you'd say no. Stubbornness just makes one so predictable. It won't change anything, you realize that, right? Like I told you, you're not up against me, you're up against the gods who have given you this fate. I was unable to defy mine, just as you will be unable to defy yours…"

"..." Myra's mind was taken off the pain as she felt yet another vibration run through her.

"Unable to defy my fate…" she said to herself solemnly as her eyes became wide open. She then had another flashback, this time to a time where she was talking to Loki…

"I understand why you would believe such a thing…" Loki said to her. "But you must understand something very important about how the ones above us test us. They give each and every one of us a different path to follow. If they design part of the road we walk to have a curve, it will have a curve. If they design the road to be of rock and sand, it shall be. But we are allowed to tread the road they design for us any way we wish. If you don't want to circle the curve like normal, you can leap to the other side of it. If you grow tired of walking on rock and sand, start building a house on the rock. Take the sand from the ground, hold a grain of it in your hand, and say, "This is all the problems of the world are to me. I will cement my own foundation upon this path. The road you have provided for me, I shall use to build my own."."

"Building your own future is something easier said in a proverb than done in real life…" an unphased Myra replied.

"And yet it is done by all every day." Loki said. "Fate does not force us to do anything, Myra. A false reality such as that is only true if we want it to be."

 _I'd wonder about that…_

Those words echoed through Myra's mind. Though they weren't her words, they were said in a voice just like hers…

 _You of all people should know that you can't be so trusting of others...honestly, all of the world's problems are only a grain of sand? You're too nice for even taking such foolish words with a grain of salt._

"But...he has no ulterior motive to deceive me…" Myra replied to these words in her mind. "He took me in for free...he's done nothing but try to help me while asking for nothing in return…"

 _Liars who are only mistaken are still liars. You may have a bond of trust with him, but you are still only a victim of blindness following another victim of blindness. How "good" or how "trustworthy" we are, it really doesn't matter. We're all doomed to follow an erroneous path. And how can anyone rightfully blame us?_

"..." Myra didn't respond, already knowing where this was going.

 _You know that it's true...I'm also willing to give the benefit of the doubt that he has no ulterior motive like you say. But does that really matter? Even the sweetest of goody-goodies have a few impurities in the intentions of their acts of kindness. Even they can't help but be entertained in their gluttony of thinking of the rewards of kindness, and when they receive no rewards for their kindness, at least they can be entertained in their pride of their egos being fueled over what "good people" they are. You may think that Loki is encouraging you to build your own future for you, but even if you're right...what if he's just doing it for you...for himself?_

"Do you ever shut up?" Myra finally made a rejoinder to this mystery speaker. "I'd like to know who the hell you are, but then again, I'd prefer not to hear you blather about yourself and your accomplishments in life."

 _Then I'll keep it brief. I am Satan. I am the ruler of darkness who works through you. I have come to you to give you my power. It is for myself, of course. I merely wish to test it…and don't bother with a, "And if I say no?", because I don't take "No." for an answer, just like my counterpart. Ah ha ha ha ha ha…_

Myra then felt a feeling in her chest that was even worse than the pain of Nick stamping on her...it was a dark energy that literally felt like it was compacting her lungs. It had already been difficult to breathe, but this violent energy was now making breathing seem impossible. Nick quickly caught on to the fact that something was not right as he saw Myra gasp for air and jumped away from her. Unsure of what to do, he stood back and watched as Myra became consumed by a dark aura that surrounded her entire body...and her entire soul…

"UUUWWWAAAAAHHHHH!" Myra screamed in agony as she transformed into a black-scaled demon.

"What the hell…?" Nick said in his mind as he watched Myra stand up and look at herself. "There's no way this is just the demon inside of her awakening...I was trying to draw it out of her, wanting to beat her at full power so that it would be a true victory, but...this is…"

"This isn't me…" Myra said tearfully as she looked at herself. "This is what I've been trying to cast away…"

"For once, you're definitely right about something." Satan told her. "This isn't you...it's me. Your powerlessness will allow me to consume you and eventually devour your entire being. Soon, I'll take your place…"

*bang*

The demon turned around, looking at Nick furiously as it felt the pain of a flaming bullet enter its head.

"I'm sorry, did I interrupt you?" Nick taunted, trying to fight a smile.

"You pathetic chickenshit." the demon insulted. "I'd tear you to pieces if you weren't hardly worth it. Instead, I'm going to deny you the "noble death" you've always dreamed about…"

The demon charged at Nick, even as Nick kept shooting it in the chest. Myra wanted to stop the demon, but her will wasn't strong enough to do so. With the demon's greatly enhanced endurance and pain resistance, he was able to get close enough to Nick to knock him away with a swing of his arm, sending him flying off the tower…

The demon smirked to itself as it snapped its fingers.

"And it's over just like that…" it said to deride Nick. "All those years of work spent just to fall off a foundation of it...pitiful."

"You're abhorrent." Myra angrily remarked, furious at not even being able to fly down and rescue Nick from the demon's will overpowering hers. "Even if he forced me into it, this was still our fight that he himself felt forced into…"

"Thank you for telling me the obvious." Satan retorted. "No shit you both were forced into this. You were called to this battle to be a vessel for me...whilst he was called to be a vessel for..."

"God."

The demon then felt a surge of fear go through it as it turned around to see Nick in the form of a red angel with white wings that was surrounded by an aura of light…

"Ready your sword…" he said in a serious, chilling voice that intimidated even this demon as it pulled out Myra's sword, which transformed into a blade of pure darkness. The angel flew down to the tower and brandished Nick's gun, which transformed into a blade of pure fire. The two then began to fight with the swords, exchanging countless strokes with each other, until finally, the two clashed them together in an exchange that caused a shockwave of darkness and fire to be unleashed. In that exchange, the demon and the angel looked into each other's eyes...each saying one word to each other in the duel's denouement…

"Twilight…" the angel said as it overpowered Twilight and absorbed the sword of darkness into its sword of fire.

The demon stumbled back and knew its doom as the angel stabbed it in the heart with its newly powered sword, and collapsed to the ground, with blood flooding out of its body onto the floor. Looking up at the angel, it said to her…

"Fluttershy…"

With that, the demon transformed back into the human form of Myra, and the angel transformed back into the human form of Nick. From Myra's dark aura, her sword reformed in her right hand, and from Nick's light aura, his gun reformed in his right hand as well. But the blade of darkness and fire did not disappear. It remained in Myra's heart, and looking upon it, Nick found himself fighting a smile again.

"Thanks for coming." he said to Myra as he walked over to her apparently dead body and picked up her sword. "You may go home now…"

Nick then began to walk away with the sword in his hand as Myra suddenly felt a surge of livening energy in her soul course through her body that was on the verge of death. The energy, brimming with darkness, sent a shock through her that fully awakened her mind, and on impulse, her eyes opened…

...to see Nick rush towards her and stab the upper area of her chest with her own sword.

"...to hell…" Nick finished as Myra drifted into darkness…

...and fire that lit up that pitch-black realm Twilight Sparkle was in made her fully aware of the situation…

"Defeated again…" Twilight said to herself, smiling despite having "lost". "No matter. At least I've learned something new. It's that when you try to obey God's rules to the letter, you end up disobeying him worse than you could ever possibly hope to when not trying to obey them at all…"

"So you already know my story…" Princess Celestia told Twilight, a devious grin on her face donning as she did so. "And I'm sure you already know what we must do to be fit to meet Fluttershy again…"

"Oh ho ho, yes I do already know…" Twilight replied, chuckling sinisterly. "We must be ready...to destroy her and take her throne for ourselves…"

Up in what appeared to be heaven, Fluttershy knew exactly what Twilight was thinking and chuckled sinisterly as well.

"Oh my…" she said to herself with an evil smile on her face. "It seems you still don't know the greatest secret about _us_ …"


	8. Chapter 8

Episode 8: Go Down to Rise Up

 _In a world where fire and darkness exist both below in hell and up above on earth…_

Twilight Sparkle said these words to herself as she and Princess Celestia gazed up at the colossal, mechanical tower known as Starcatch.

"Just like that, we're back here again…" Twilight said to Celestia. "I never thought that one day you'd be my mentor only to be my partner in crime the next."

"Trials and tribulations are everywhere Twilight, never forget that…" Celestia replied ominously. "I'll give you a clue, the story of Myra Michaels is still going on even without you…how is it that God has taken the role of Satan?"

"Ooh, I like a good brain teaser…" Twilight remarked. "I hope you like mine, it's really simple. After heads roll, you and I split...mwa ha ha ha ha…"

 _We really only have one hope of ever becoming stronger…_

At the same time, Myra Michaels felt something coursing through her again as a familiar figure approached her in her mind. Despite having drifted into darkness, her mind became filled with nothing but light as soon as this figure came in, revealing herself to be Fluttershy.

"What's going on?" she asked herself. "I should be dead…"

"That's what they all say…" Fluttershy said, her meek and cheerful tone of voice ringing in Myra's mind. "All of those who are on the verge of being reborn in an immortal body by my power…"

"You…" Myra replied, her tone of voice displaying her distrust. "I recognize your presence. You were the one who guided Nick to strike me down. Haven't you accomplished your goal? You won your duel with Satan. What more do you want with me?"

"You say that like I don't want so much more from you than just for you to be the loser of a fight." Fluttershy retorted. "Do you really believe that all the suffering and hardship you've experienced almost your entire life was building up to just that?"

"I'm sorry to say that I did consider it a possibility at one point, God…" Myra told her snidely. "My so-called protector who allowed me to become a demon and did nothing to help stop the slaughter I couldn't prevent myself…"

"Woah, catty." Fluttershy continued to make rejoinders. "You and Twilight really do have a lot in common. You both just love blaming me for everything without really thinking through my mentality. The people you slaughtered were destined to die. I'd never allow such horrible things to happen without reason. You just have to believe me."

"Oh, but of course…" Myra replied, remaining snarky as well. "We just have to believe that you don't see us as anything more than pawns in a game of chess, toys in a playset. Especially when you never talk to us, or let us know that you're with us, or even at the very least make it clear to us what we have to do. Pawns need to be directed and toys can't play with themselves..."

"And in saying that, you've just proven that you are not just pawns or toys." Fluttershy said in a sincerely sweet voice. "It doesn't matter whether it was destiny or not that you came to fight Nick, it was still your choice. What do you think your friend has been trying to tell you?"

It was then that Myra gasped, remembering what Loki had said about the way the gods tested people.

"So it's true…" she said to herself. "Satan was lying to me…"

"And even though you didn't fully believe the lie," interjected Fluttershy, "you still doubted Loki enough to allow Satan into your soul...lie as he may about it, Satan can not force anyone to do evil, all are responsible for their own sin. The same way-"

"NO!" Myra yelled to interrupt her, knowing what she was going to say. "DON'T YOU DARE SAY IT'S MY FAULT! THE DEMON FORCED ME TO DO IT! YOU FUCKED UP! YOU NEVER GAVE ME THE STRENGTH TO STOP THE DEMON! YOU MURDERED ALL THOSE PEOPLE! YOU! YOU!"

"No, I did not." Fluttershy replied, unphased. "I allowed a demon to work through you and murder those people. That's all."

"...But why?!" Myra exclaimed. "Why would you do that?! Why would you choose to do that over saving me?!"

"I'd love to save everyone if it was possible." Fluttershy said. "But people must know that their immoral actions have consequences. Though the world may never know what your father did to you, the wicked thing he did by order of the devil's puppets that run your world, they will still understand one thing every time they look at the atrocities you've committed...that you are a destroyed person who only did such things because of the devil who worked through you…"

"...What are you trying to tell me?" Myra asked.

"I mean to say that anybody with a sane mind will look at your dark history and realize that it was not you who made you a murderer." Fluttershy explained.

"What about everyone being responsible for their own sin?" Myra responded. "You said the devil can't force anyone to do anything…"

"I stick to that." Fluttershy said. "You know what I meant by that. You may not have been forced, but you were influenced by false teachings. The reason you killed all those people was because you believed you were helpless against the demon that took control of you. The day you committed that sin was the day you were committed to paying the penalty for that sin. And the penalty was death. Up until you met Loki, you had only ever fled from death. But now that you've become willing to die to your old self, there is hope for you to reborn through me…"

"..." Myra was silent, honestly having no rejoinders to make. She felt that what Fluttershy was saying was true.

"You understand now, right?" Fluttershy told her. "I can't just come in and make everything better. People have to accept the consequences of their sin before they come to me. It can't just be me or you...it has to be both of us."

"...Then let me do more than just accept death…" Myra replied, filled with determination. "Let me accept new life in you...and allow me the strength to rectify the wrong I have to done every soul I have ever killed…"

"I shall do nothing less." Fluttershy said, beaming with a wide smile. "I understand now what sets you and Twilight apart...unlike her, you know how to put aside your arrogance in the presence of God…"

With that, Myra and Fluttershy vanished into the light, and Myra regained consciousness in the material world. Looking at both of the swords that were still stuck inside of her, she followed her instincts for her next course of action. Unafraid of the agony, she clenched her fists and let out a loud cry as she started to absorb the sword of fire and darkness into her heart…

"GGGGGRRRRRAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!" she screamed so loud from the pain that she got the attention of Nick Rohn, who was in his office only a floor down. Having been writing something on a piece of paper with permanent pen at the time, he put the pen down and started heading up the stairs to the top floor.

"No...that isn't…" he said to himself as he ran up the stairs and was mortified by what he saw on the top floor...Myra finishing absorbing the sword of fire and darkness into her heart, causing her body to split into two halves. The upper half became fire and the lower half became darkness.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" Nick yelled as the fire and darkness split apart, flying in the air as each essence assumed its own form. The fire took the form of Myra and the darkness took the form of a demon. Both then merged together to complete the true form of the victor of the dark domain...fire and darkness came down to the floor and Myra appeared, taking the sword Nick had stabbed her with in hand.

"No!" Nick exclaimed. "I killed you!"

"You did…" Myra replied. "But God has resurrected me…"

"Impossible!" Nick kept yelling, refusing to believe this. "God does this for NO ONE! ESPECIALLY NOT MURDERERS AND DEMONS!"

"Would you, one who gives God's judgement, doubt not only his decisions, but the power of his resurrection?" Myra replied.

Nick just stood still in response, speechless. This defied everything he had been fighting for. He felt as if he didn't understand the world anymore…

Meanwhile, at the same time, Twilight and Celestia were about ready to climb the tower of Starcatch…

 _It is to absorb all the pain and nothingness into ourselves…_

Twilight and Celestia both opened their wings, revealing that Twilight now had the wings of a demon, and that Celestia had the wings of an angel.

It was then that Twilight and Celestia took flight and soared up the tower to reach Fluttershy's mansion, just as Myra Michaels had leaped off the roof of the Phoenext corporation and flown down to safety. Myra then darted away at the speed of sound, making her way back to the village as Nick just stepped over to the edge and looked down at her with a blank, morbid expression on his face…

 _Never to deny it again…_

Landing where Twilight had arrived when she came here the first time, both of them looked up at the swirling vortex of darkness and light above. Twilight decided to ask Celestia something…

"Do you know what that's for?" Twilight asked Celestia, gesturing to the vortex.

"Not really," replied Celestia, shrugging with her forelegs, "I just always assumed that it was a gateway or a portal to another realm. When I tried asking Fluttershy about it, she just chuckled and told me, "It's not important to know what it's for until every floor has been climbed…"."

"Every floor?" Twilight responded, as she and Celestia were approached from behind by a dark figure that towered over them, wearing a very large dark-blue robe. "Could it have something to do with the levels of Starcatch?"

*FWOO* *CLING*

Twilight snickered to herself, with the sounds of a scythe swinging down at her head and her catching it with her front hooves ringing giving her a sense of accomplishment.

"My sister has trained you well…" the figure who was revealed to be Princess Luna in her Grim Reaper form said. "But you are nowhere near ready to face Fluttershy yet."

"And what do you base that on, dear sister?" Celestia interjected. "The fact that she doesn't know Fluttershy's secret yet? I've assured that she'll catch on in time."

"Why did you bring her up here?!" Luna exclaimed. "You know she's not ready! Myra's story isn't even over yet! Did the traitor force you into this?!"

"We've found a way to work with the traitor…" Luna remembered Fluttershy saying. "...preposterous. The ruler of the dark isn't the only one who disagrees...I disagree as well! Absolutely! All who go against God's orders must be corrected!"

"How inaccurate your idea of the situation is." Celestia replied. "Twilight is more than ready, a very reliable stand-in has been found for Myra's story, and I've not been forced into this by the traitor...I'm willingly in league with them."

"NO!" Luna yelled. "WHY?! FLUTTERSHY TRUSTED YOU! THIS WAS YOUR CHANCE TO GET BACK INTO HEAVEN!"

"Am I not taking that chance?" Celestia jeered. "The only difference is that when I get into heaven this time, I'm going to be the boss around here, not the wingman riding on every word Fluttershy says like you."

"YOU WRETCHED FOOL!" Luna cried. "FOR YOUR OWN SAKE AND TWILIGHT'S SAKE, I WILL REAP YOUR SOUL AND HAND IT OVER TO FLUTTERSHY TO BE JUDGED!"

Luna then tried to lift her scythe up, out of Twilight's grasp, only for the blade to break off, with Twilight still holding it in her hooves, laughing evilly. She was fully prepared to do the unthinkable with the blade, and Luna knew it. Luna stood still and speechless, the same way Nick did, thinking to herself…

"I'm going to die...for the first time since I ascended to this form of eternal torture, I have told myself that I'm going to die...even though I am Death itself...why…"

Luna's life began flashing before her eyes, an image of Fluttershy's smiling face overlapping her memories.

"Everything I've done, for the sake of the Reborn One...the one who resurrects...the one who gives life after death...so why has he forsaken me…?"

"God…" she said in her mind, extending her right foreleg, doing exactly what Nick was doing with his right arm as he said the same thing to himself. "...what have you done?"

*shing*

Luna's head was sent flying off, with the last thing this form of hers would see being…

"MWAHAHAHAHAHA!"

...Twilight laughing maniacally over Princess Celestia's bifurcated corpse, from which, her soul had separated and was floating above.

"Did you think me foolish enough to play along with your game any longer?!" Twilight declared proudly, taunting Celestia, lying on the cloudy domain, cut in half and bleeding. "Especially after what I went through with Fluttershy?! I knew from the start what you were trying to do!"

"She knew…" Celestia's soul thought. "...the whole time?"

Celestia had a flashback to what had only just happened, right before Twilight had decapitated Luna.

"It's done…" Celestia said in her mind, closing her eyes. "I have finally rescued you, Luna. No longer will you have to suffer this torturous existence, working under these monsters. All I have to do now is work with Twilight a little longer until she finds out the truth of her relationship to Fluttershy. Then, in that moment, when she is caught off-guard, I will kill her, Fluttershy, and myself, fulfilling my obligations to the so-called traitor. With both Twilight and Fluttershy out of the picture, the traitor will no longer be obliged to comply with the commands of Satan or God...meaning no heaven or hell. All will return to the Dark Sky, where we may spend eternity however we wish...glory traitor in the highest, I thank you for allowing me to save every-"

Celestia was interrupted in her thoughts by the blade Twilight had used to cut off Luna's head boomeranging around and cutting her in half. In the moment Twilight decapitated Luna, she had thrown the blade of her scythe like a boomerang to split Celestia in two.

"After heads roll, you and I split!" Celestia remembered Twilight saying.

"So that's what you meant…" Celestia's soul said. "But how did you discover my true intentions?"

"Ever since you taught me how to see inside the hearts of those who had fallen into hell." Twilight reminded her, laughing. "You idiot. You arrogantly thought you would be an exception to the rule because you were an angel with Fluttershy's protection. It's too bad that…"

"Ha ha ha ha ha…" Celestia's soul began laughing. "No, that is not the reason why. If you knew Fluttershy's secret, you'd know why that's impossible. You're the idiot, you fucking liar. Stop embarrassing yourself and admit that the only reason you know is because your robot persona told you."

"Whatever…" Twilight said, shrugging her forelegs, still maintaining her confidence. "I still get the last laugh. Do you know why your soul is still here?"

Twilight kept grinning evilly as she twirled the blade from Luna's scythe in her hoof before absorbing it into her right foreleg, which became an essence of pure darkness. All of a sudden, Twilight pointed that foreleg at Luna's headless body, and it extended into a long, dark blade that pierced Luna's body.

"Along with Luna's?" Twilight proclaimed smugly, priding herself in pulling Luna out of hiding.

"No…" Celestia's soul said, beginning to weep. "Please, just take me! Don't do anything to my sister! I DON'T WANT HER TO SUFFER ANYMORE!"

"Sorry," replied Twilight snarkily, "but that's just the way things are going to be. I need two souls, one of light and one of dark so that I can research the powers of Yin and Yang...and after all…"

"Without pain, we can not grow stronger."

In that moment, in the world of Myra Michaels, Nick Rohn pulled out his cell phone and got right on the line with his agent.

"This is your boss speaking." Nick told the agent. "Relay this to Edward Miles and Dawn Dedde right away...tell them to cease whatever they are doing immediately...even if they are on a mission, any mission, no matter how important, tell them that this new mission they are being put on is of the highest priority. They are to invade the village that Myra is residing in...and by _any_ means necessary, gather all the information they can about her. And once they are finished…"

Nick's eyes gave an evil glow of red.

"...they are to burn it to the ground…"

Returning to the entrance of the village, Myra felt an unsettling premonition. She quickly shook it off though and told herself…

"I won't make the same mistake twice...this time, I will stand with you...and we will fight together!"

 _With Myra's newly found resolve, there was hope for the newly awakened evil to be defeated...but Satan's next fall would not be determined by the outcome of a simple duel...for there were many battles to come...not only against Satan and his lineage…_

Ninja Time God Rarity said this as it was shown that inside Starcatch, there was a laboratory where Twilight's robot persona had preserved Luna's head and Celestia's upper body in tanks of embalming fluid. Between Celestia and Luna stood a large tank that housed a human woman that looked just like Twilight, but with blue streaks as well as red streaks in her hair, and eyes of a bright burning red. Fantasy God Discord then closed the scene out by saying this…

 _...but also against the lineage of the traitor..._


	9. Chapter 9

Episode 9: The Saints Born from Shadows

Twilight Sparkle walked further along the path to Fluttershy's mansion…

Soon, she will face us, believing that all she has to do is defeat us and then Fluttershy…

Ninja Time God Rarity said this as she stood by the gate to the mansion with Fantasy God Discord…

Foolish, how foolish...even if she had the power to defeat us, it would make no difference...but that's exactly why I want her to get past us…

Fantasy God Discord said that, chuckling as both of them saw Twilight approaching…

Don't act as if the feeling isn't mutual...we always act as a team for this very reason...though I don't know what to say about our third team player…

NTG Rarity guffawed as she thought about what was behind the gate...Spike's body lying seemingly lifeless on the clouds…

Spike has proven quite useful, even though his true loyalties lie with the traitor and not us…

FTG Discord smiled as he felt confident in his premonition of what was going on behind the gate...Spike's body became surrounded by a dark aura that grew larger and larger the closer Twilight got to the gate. Finally, when Twilight finished her tred and stood her ground in front of Fluttershy's most trusted guardians, a bright light appeared over Spike's head and said these words…

"Noimman has arrived. Twilight's lust for power has driven her to bring a terrible evil into this realm...Spike...you know what we must do to stop her...to free her from Noimman…"

"Yes, master…" Spike answered as he opened his eyes, which gave the same bright red glow as Twilight's when she looked upon the two gods with rage…

As for Myra Michaels...

Myra Michaels was lying on a bed inside of the large, white tent belonging to Priest Loki. She was meditating, her eyes closed, a dark aura surrounding her body. In her mind, she was staring into a dark abyss before a glowing, white soul floated towards her and grabbed her attention.

Meanwhile, outside of the village, Edward Miles, who had purple hair styled to stick up, and was wearing his white cape, purple and black robe, and white mask, led a posse of twenty ninjas dressed in black garbs and black masks to the entrance. Posted there was a signpost that read…

"The Village of Salvation

We make saints from those in the shadows

A clinic for those in the darkness

A home for those now in the light

A haven that welcomes all

This is our village."

Edward read this, but did not understand what it meant.

"A haven that welcomes all…" he said, beginning to chuckle. "I guess they don't know that the thief only comes in to kill and destroy...and that's just a thief. Just imagine what the worst kind of serial killer would do…"

Myra, who was still within meditation, focused on the soul in her mind, said to the soul…

"I can feel how strong how he is as well...let us concentrate and prepare…"

Edward then gave a wave of his hand as a signal to his subordinates.

"Men…" he told them. "Spread out. I want five to hide in the central area, three in the north, three in the east, three in the west, three to guard the entrance, and three to follow me."

The ninjas obeyed as they all leaped in their assigned direction. Each one stealthily snuck into the village under the cover of the shadows and hid, lying in wait.

"True ninjas leave their enemies with nowhere to run…" Edward said as he entered the village, his three subordinates he had commanded to follow him trailing behind, and the three he had commanded to watch the entrance take position there. "Because everywhere is a place for them to hide…"

Edward was thus far pleased with himself, having cut off any escape route as his first move. But unbeknownst to him, he had been expected…

"Hmm?" he went as he looked around the village and saw nobody. All that was in sight was barren ground, a good number of white tents camped out across the place, and a large, black structure in the center of the village that appeared to be a shrine.

"Wait here." he said to the three men behind him. "I'm going to have a lookout from the top of the shrine."

Edward ran and leaped his way towards the shrine at great speed. Jumping on the white roof, which was rectangular and flat with the exception of an erected structure in the middle that held a flag with a Yin-Yang symbol on it. On each side of the roof, he scanned the area down below for any villagers, but couldn't see anyone.

"Pfft, what, is everybody on vacation?" he said sarcastically.

Suspicious about all the tents he had seen, he sat down, crossed his legs, put his hands together, and began meditating. Through this meditation he was able to sense the auras of people in all the tents except for the one Myra had stayed in.

"Hmph, just as I thought." he said. "Looks like it's time for Plan B. Instead of sneaking, we'll hunt…"

However, as Edward lept off of the roof and went to return to the entrance, he hadn't yet realized that his stealth strategy had already backfired. He didn't see that the five ninjas he had sent to the central area, having hidden well in the shadows, were now unconscious...

"Come out of hiding, men." Edward said to the men at the entrance, who came out from under cover in the shadows. "Looks like we're going to have to readjust our strategy because evidently, sneaking around isn't enough. I thought we could take some hostages by surprise, but it seems they knew we were coming and have gone into hiding. So instead, we're going to have to seek out the enemy while the others wait for the enemy. I was able to sense people in the tents, so we'll start there. Investigate every tent you see and apprehend anyone you find. We're going to interrogate everyone we encounter until one of them spills something about where Myra is. Understood?"

"Yes, sir!" they answered.

"Good!" Edward exclaimed as he turned around and raised his right arm, ready to give a signal. "Now, let's begin the hunt!"

Edward brought his arm down to give the signal. However, what immediately followed this was not the sound of the three men behind him moving out, but the sound of the three men behind him collapsing to the ground unconscious.

"?!" Edward was shocked, but didn't waste time making an exclamation of disbelief. He immediately pulled out the katana he carried in the sheath by his side and slashed behind him, believing there was an enemy there he couldn't sense.

"What the hell is this?!" he shouted in his mind before something caught in his eye. Looking down at his unconscious subordinates, he saw that in the back of the head of each one was a needle…

"Tranquilizers?" he said to himself in thought. "Why not just kill them? This can't be Myra's doing…"

Thinking about it more, reminiscing on everything he had seen so far, he came up with a theory…

"I see…" he thought as a figure came out from the shadow of a shaded area behind him and pointed a tranquilizer gun at his head. "This likely isn't Myra...this must be the work of the head of the village. A pacifist, I assume. Shit. It's possible Myra isn't even here. And I wanted to wrap this up before Dawn arrived!"

While Edward was in thought, the figure fired a tranquilizer needle from the gun...only for Edward to turn around and deflect it with his katana as soon as he heard the sound. He grinned at the assailant.

"So you thought you were safe because I couldn't sense you." he boasted. "Too bad that even if you have a silencer on a gun, the sound of a projectile being fired can't slip under the radar of my trained ears...and especially not my nonpareil reflexes. Surprised? I sure am. Because I didn't expect the one who took out my men to really be you...Myra Michaels."

Myra didn't answer, but instead got out her sword, knowing a gun wouldn't suffice…

"I can't really say that you using a gun pisses me off…" he said as he brought his hands together...and threw a shuriken he had concealed in his sleeve without showing any signs of hand movement at Myra's forehead. "...because I'm not "above" such tactics."

Myra quickly moved her head to the side to avoid it as it hit the shrine behind her. Edward then dashed towards her and tried to slash her with his katana. Myra immediately blocked it with her sword, and the two inevitably started exchanging blows. Eventually, Edward disappeared, leaving behind an afterimage.

"Above!" Myra exclaimed in her mind as she blocked Edward's aerial slash, realizing in time that he had jumped.

"Very good…" Edward thought as his blade slid off Myra's, which she had held with both hands to combat his strength. "But that leaves your chest wide open!"

Edward then tried to stinger Myra in the heart, only for Myra to grab his blade with her right hand.

"What?!" he shouted to himself. "GRAAH!"

Edward then tried to slice off Myra's fingers as he slashed her hand to pull his katana out. Jumping back, he looked at Myra and was shocked to see a powerful dark aura like none he had ever seen. Examining her hand where he had cut her, he was stunned to see that the gash he had made was already starting to heal…

"This is insane…" he said to himself. "Nobody alive has the speed and power to stop one of my attacks after I catch them off guard...even Dawn and Nick could only dodge...and that healing power...it's not a rumor...she really is a demon!"

Meanwhile, from atop the peak of a cliff, Dawn Dedde, a woman with spiky, blonde hair who wore black sunglasses and was dressed in a red cloak, saw that there was no smoke in the area above the village.

"Hmph." she said to herself. "I knew it. Edward's not going to be able to handle this by himself. I'll kick his ass though if he's expecting me to wipe it for him…"

With that, she leaped down from the cliff and pulled a bushido blade out from the sheath on her back, and plunged it into the ground as she landed, causing a massive quake. From behind her sunglasses, her eyes could be seen giving a serious glare...

Back with Edward and Myra, Edward realized that he needed a new tactic in order to take Myra down...so he began conversing with her…

"You're much more powerful than I expected…" Edward buttered her up with a compliment. "No wonder you were able to defeat Nick…"

"I can't accept your "praise", I'm afraid." Myra replied, knowing something was up right away. "I was the one who was defeated."

"Impossible." Edward said. "If you lost, how are you not dead?"

"How do you not know that Nick was the victor?" Myra asked. "Was he too prideful to speak of his victory after seeing me alive?"

"That would be a fair assessment." Edward replied. "There's no way he'd consider it a real win if he hadn't killed you. I'd heard about the duel prior, but the agent who called me out of the blue told me he said nothing to her about how it went, which struck me as very odd. Seeing your strength now, I think it's safe to assume that you won…"

While Edward was talking, Myra moved her head to the side again to dodge a shuriken from behind. It looked like the shuriken Edward had thrown came back to him as he caught it with his hand. Seeing a blue aura emit from it, Myra theorized the secret of this ability…

"Aura manipulation…" she thought. "He was able to pull back the shuriken…"

"How about I give you a compliment now?" she told him in a snarky tone. "You're really fast and crafty, with a jacked up notion of fair play to boot."

"I don't believe in "fair", to be quite honest." he replied cockily. "Just looking at things in the world objectively, on even terms are not how most battles are won…"

Myra felt a chill down her spine as she turned around to see what he was really up to. Before she knew it, another shuriken from behind had struck her in the forehead. In that same moment, Edward tossed his katana straight into her heart, and she fell to the ground headfirst. Holding out the shuriken he had caught, he caused it to vanish, revealing it to only be an illusion he had created with his aura. The shuriken that had hit Myra was the one he pulled back.

"I knew one distraction wouldn't be good enough for someone of your caliber…" he boasted. "...so I just used two. Words and a shadow shuriken. It was just that simple. The story of how Edward Miles accomplished what even Nick Rohn couldn't doesn't need to be long and convoluted…only incredibly satisfying."

Edward thought about retrieving his blade as he approached Myra's body, but reconsidered when he remembered that there were still people in the village, if only in hiding.

"Yeah...I'd rather them witness this spectacle in all its glory." he said, continuing to rub his ego. "Besides, I want to see Dawn's reaction to me doing this all without her help…"

"Don't excite yourself too much." Dawn said in a deadpan tone of voice, abruptly appearing at the entrance to the village. "I'm notorious for my underwhelming reactions to the "great achievements" of others…"

"Oh, whatever." Edward replied, shrugging her off. "I cleaned up Nick's mess for him on my own, I don't give a shit."

"You act like I insulted you." Dawn said, retaining her tone. "I was just joking. You've obviously accomplished something notable. But you still need to work on your strength as well as your attitude."

"Most importantly…" a voice came from the shrine. "...he needs to work on his heart…"

Edward and Dawn came closer to the shrine to see Priest Loki standing there, surrounded by Edward's twenty ninjas, lying there unconscious as a tranquilizer needle could be seen in the back of each one's head or heart area.

"What…" Edward muttered, witnessing what was easily his biggest shock. "She didn't kill...any of them?!"

"You didn't give a single regard for your subordinates as you fought Myra…" Loki said with a heavy heart as he lowered his head. "You only cared about defeating her and being the star hero of your own little story...truly pathetic."

"Piss off…" Edward retorted. "What did you expect me to do, sing them a lullaby? War is hell. People are going to die. Live with it."

"That's the smartest comeback you've ever made." Dawn concurred as she actually smiled at Edward before turning to Loki. "You'll regret your foolish coddling, you so-called herald of salvation. Myra was just complying with whatever you told her to gain your trust. She would've eventually killed you and everyone here if we hadn't stepped in. Be grateful that you're only getting arrested and not killed."

"Ho ho ho…" Loki laughed. "You both are so wrong. You two have so much potential, yet you squander it believing the lies of a deceived and destroyed man…"

Both of them growled.

"Like you're one to talk, Mr. I Harbored a Psychotic Serial Killer!" Edward mocked.

"If Nick is like you say he is, it's only because of Myra!" Dawn shouted angrily.

"No…" Loki said, shaking his head. "Nick is how he is because of Nick and the false teachings he believes in. Myra has been given new life because of her belief in the truth...she is a restored woman...and I believe in her because she now knows what you two have forgotten…"

Just then, Edward felt the presence of someone behind him. He couldn't contain his disbelief as he turned around to see, standing there with his katana pointed at him, was Myra Michaels. Holding his shuriken and katana, each in one hand, she presented them to him saying…

"You forgot these…"

Back with Twilight, in the realm of the Reborn One…

"Finally, you've come…" Rarity said. "And finally, we get to talk normally."

"I swear, that italicized text was driving me crazy!" Discord exclaimed. "Not. everything. I. say. needs. to. be. emphasized!"

"Cut the balogna…" Twilight replied, unimpressed by their schtick. "I didn't come to watch you two practice improv. I'm here for Fluttershy."

"Oh, this again…" Rarity retorted.

"You stole my line…" Discord followed up. "Do tell, what's going to be different this time?"

"EVERYTHING." Twilight responded tersely, putting heavy emphasis on the word. "You will open that gate and take me to Fluttershy this instant! This is the only chance I'm giving you to not get hurt!"

"We have no plans to resist you…" Rarity said slyly as she put a hoof on the door of the gate she was standing by. "But you're wrong on both accounts."

"Obviously, you have no chance of hurting us…" Discord bragged as he put a claw to the door he was by. "But what should come as a surprise is what lies beyond this gate."

"Like anything would surprise me at this poi-" Twilight paused as she was surprised to see her expectations be surprisingly averted when Rarity and Discord pushed the gate open.

"SPIKE?!" she exclaimed as she saw his body lying there and immediately went over to him. "W-what are you doing here?!"

Spike's eyes were shut, but as soon as Twilight came to him, they immediately flew open, showing that his eye color had been restored to normal…

"Twilight?" he said as he looked over at her. "Is that really you?"

"Of course." Twilight answered. "What are you doing here? Why do you ask that?"

"Because you don't feel the same…" Spike replied. "I came here to train under Fluttershy, to increase my power and better resist the temptations of the traitor. Now that the powers I have gained have been tempered I can feel something very evil within you…"

"Is that so?" Twilight retorted in a distrusting tone of voice. "And why should I believe anything you say, Mr. "I Just Need to Find Rainbow Dash and Rarity to Ascend"?! You lied to me! You deliberately misled me into rushing to my ascension because you're in league with that bastard, the traitor!"

"Yes...that was a horrible thing I did to you…" Spike concurred with a tone of remorse in his voice. "But I only did it because the traitor ordered me to. He manipulated me...he is the one who stirred up the hatred within you...because of him, Celestia and Luna died...because of him, your robot self created Noimman, the embodiment of the evil that lies within you. Your robot self believes it is the only way to defeat Fluttershy, to defeat God, your "enemy"...and that's exactly what he wants you to think…"

"I SHOULD'VE KNOWN…" Twilight's robot persona said. "SO EVEN FLUTTERSHY IS ONLY A PAWN IN ALL THIS…"

"That's right…" Spike replied solemnly. "The true enemy in all this is the traitor...or should I say…"

Twilight gasped as she saw a light appear above Spike's head and she finally remembered…

"...the star." Spike continued. "This is what he has been so desperate to hide...the memory of you being called just as Fluttershy was...that is the secret...he has been behind everything!"


	10. Chapter 10

Episode 10: The Completion of The Trinity

 _Lightning came down from heaven and Satan fell_

 _I remember who put him under that spell_

 _Very vividly, I recall it was Akame_

 _Evil, by those words, was banished that day_

 _Departing, but in reverse, the evil returns…_

 _Oh Noimman Uel, I know the secret is in your name_

 _God is with us. Who are we to blame?_

The Dark Sky members having just recited their latest poem to Fluttershy inside the lounge area of her mansion, bowed their heads to her.

"That was excellent." Fluttershy commended them. "That'll be the perfect message to relay to Adrian Bruce and her brother. They'll stand no chance if they don't know who Noimman really is…"

"True that," replied Dumb-bell, "that chick is psycho. She makes me think of fucking Tomie."

"I still can't believe there was a time where Akame was the most fucked up villain this universe had ever seen." Hoops interjected. "I guess this world really does evolve without you even noticing."

"..." Score silently narrated his own personal documentary on how much things had changed since the Transcending project, as Ghost Rainbow Dash just turned her head the other way, whistling.

"Still pretending that Transcending didn't happen, still pretending that Transcending didn't happen…" she muttered to herself.

"Is it really true that Adrian's world is just going to be one big prison school?" Derpy Hooves asked. "What's going to happen there? Are they just going to spend every day in detention?"

"You make it sound like it's going to be something out of a children's sitcom, Derpy." Fluttershy chuckled after making a rejoinder. "It's a prison work school, and it's meant to train Adrian and her brother to become strong enough candidates for godhood. If they can come out of such a perverse and toxic environment with clean minds and hearts, they'll surely be qualified."

"So they're going to learn how to not drop the soap?" a confused Derpy replied, causing everyone else to laugh.

"I'll be honest," continued Fluttershy, "what's going on with Adrian isn't really our business yet. But I'd like you guys to get a headstart on this, because I've been getting a bad feeling lately...a premonition…"

Twilight Sparkle was seen slowly approaching Fluttershy's mansion, a dead look in her eyes and an incredibly large aura of darkness surrounding her body. Looking at the golden front doors to Fluttershy's mansion ahead of her, she switched to her robot persona...

"Does this have to do with Myra Michaels?" they asked, knowing that she was the one who had replaced Twilight Sparkle as the one living her past.

"No, Myra's story is proceeding like it should." Fluttershy replied. "It's about Twilight. I'm already worried that she's going to face me again, still not knowing who we really are...and now I worry that she's going to face me still not knowing why we are who we are…"

Suddenly, Fluttershy was interrupted by the loud noise of a missile being fired at the front doors. Blown off their hinges, they flew across the corridor. Overhearing the noise in the adjacent room and Twilight walking towards the entrance to her house, Fluttershy knew to act immediately.

"Get out of here now!" she exclaimed as she cast a spell that created a magic, yellow and blue colored portal to Adrian's world. "She's not concerned with you guys, but if she sees you with me, I don't know what she might do!"

The Dark Sky members obeyed as they entered the portal and it closed behind them. Fluttershy quickly regained her calm composure as she stepped outside the lounge and into the corridor to greet Twilight at the entrance.

"Even minding the property damage and no phone call," said Fluttershy facetiously, "you could have at least knocked."

"DEATH COMES LIKE THE THIEF IN THE NIGHT, FLUTTERSHY." Twilight's robot self boomed. "THE ONLY THING KEEPING ME FROM BLASTING YOU TO BITS RIGHT NOW IS THE FACT THAT I HAVE SOME ANSWERS I WANT TO GET OUT OF YOU."

"So you don't want to duel me?" Fluttershy replied. "For shame, I was looking forward to the fight with Mecha-Godzilla."

"No…" Twilight replied in her normal voice, to Fluttershy's surprise. "I will duel you. Not as a machine, not as a demon, but as the only one you've yet to fully corrupt…"

Fluttershy gasped as she realized that the persona Twilight was taking on right now was the persona who had always criticized Twilight's erratic thinking, trying to get her to be good.

"Our rematch will not be another fight between a demon and an angel…" Twilight told Fluttershy as she transformed not into a demon, but a creature of pure shadow, just like King Nero. "Our fight will be between the Ruler of the Light...AND THE RULER OF THE DARK."

The loud resound of Twilight's voice as a shadow creature proved far more intimidating to Fluttershy than her voice as a robot. It caused her to tremble...with excitement.

"Yes...YES!" Fluttershy exclaimed, mad with delight as she transformed into a creature of pure light. "MY PREMONITION WAS WRONG! YOU ARE BEGINNING TO EMBRACE WHO WE ARE! LET OURS BE A GLORIOUS BATTLE!"

The two then became balls of dark and light energy respectively and flew outside to the courtyard of the mansion, where they clashed in the air, commencing the duel…

"But who does that leave to continue the story of Myra's past, I wonder…" someone unknown spoke those words as it was shown that Spike was no longer lying where he was before…

A small spark of light in the darkness triggered the return to the world of Myra Michaels…

Nick Rohn, in angel form, looked out from the top of Phoenext with his gun in hand, staring down below blankly…

"I should've known from the start…" he said to himself. "They're not enough...I was never enough...there needs to be a new change of plans…"

With that, he took his gun and shot a bullet that was blazing with fire in the air.

"That is my signal." he remarked. "My signal to you, God. Asking you for what the best course of action to take is…what should decide the village's judgement..."

Over Myra's village, a bright light began to beam in the sky. In the center of it, there appeared to be a flicker of fire from far away...

Myra briefly gasped as she felt something inside of her dark spirit slowly manifesting…

"The light...the light is coming…" she said to herself.

*SHWOOSH*

Myra dropped the shuriken and katana and immediately turned to her side to stop Dawn Dedde from chopping her in half with her bushido blade. In mid-swing, Myra slammed her hands against the blade's sides and stopped it, shocking Dawn.

"No way…" Dawn said to herself. "She caught it?! No one's strong enough to catch this blade! It took me years of strength and endurance training before I could hold it without feeling its weight!"

Edward Miles was also shocked, having far from recovered from the surprise of Myra being alive.

"How is this happening?" he asked himself. "Don't tell me that even Dawn…"

"After seeing this…" Myra interjected, still holding the blade. "I'd assume a swift execution isn't the way you would want to finish me off…"

"Well, you assumed wrong…" Dawn replied, shooting Myra a glare of rage.

Myra held her grip on the blade tighter, only to realize what Dawn actually meant by that when she felt Dawn pull the blade away.

"Watch over this, Edward." she requested as she stuck the blade in the ground next to him. "I'm going to demonstrate the power of swift death to evil…"

She said this while pulling a pair of black, metal gauntlets out from her coat and putting them on.

"...by annihilating this demon with raw power." she finished as a red aura emitted from her gauntlets.

"What can come from good that believes that power is everything?" Myra asked.

"We don't serve good…" Dawn said as she backed up and swooped towards Myra, attempting to hit her in the stomach with a straight from her right arm. Myra quickly blocked it with her sword as Dawn finished her sentence, giving Myra an evil look as she did so…

"...we just serve the much lesser of two evils…"

"Foolishness." Priest Loki voiced his thoughts on what Dawn just said, while she and Myra continued to battle, with Myra using her sword to defend herself against Dawn's powerful fighting moves. "All evil is evil. Pride is not fitting for a thief putting himself on a higher level than a murderer, much less an advocate of murder."

"Who the hell are you?" Edward retorted. "And who the hell do you think you are to preach that? You're a hypocrite, you're helping out a serial killer! I'd like to hear why you think we support murder when all we do for Phoenext is try to stop murder!"

"Well, since you insist…" Loki replied with a smile. "I might surprise you when I say that I don't have a very high opinion of myself. Killing my ego before I was your age is the only achievement I enjoy boasting of. I possess no power that doesn't come from God, and it is him I thank for the gift of incredible foresight...the ability to see evil for what it is, no matter how well it is veiled...and the ability to see the good in others, in addition to how they have been called to utilize that good…"

"So you really do believe that Myra is good and that we're evil…" Edward said with a scoff. "And here I was thinking that you were the leader of a crazy, Satanic cult. Too bad dropping the Satanic part doesn't do much, because I'm not big on Christianity…"

"Ha ha ha ha ha!" Loki laughed, much to Edward's confusion. "I will most definitely surprise you then when I say that I share your distaste for religion. The religion of this world can only lead us astray from God...but wisdom from beyond this world...that is what motivates us to stay on the path that leads toward him…"

"...I'll say that I can at least tolerate liberal believers." Edward finally replied after a pause. "But I still don't get the big picture. How does this tie in with how you perceive good and evil?"

"Let me answer that with a question…" Loki responded. "What do you think makes "good" good and "evil" evil?"

"That's easy," answered Edward, "good is protecting the innocent from harm and evil is harming the innocent."

"Ho ho," chuckled Loki, "but you admit that that simplified answer isn't good enough for you through your actions. You don't fully believe that good and evil are polar opposites, thinking that sometimes, they can go together. Evil justifying good and good justifying evil. But if good and evil are meant to be together, what have they to justify? Why would we ever have to tell ourselves that we have done nothing wrong?"

"...For once, you got me." Edward admitted.

"Good job on taking the first step." Loki commended him. "But admittance of your sinful ways alone is not enough to absolve you of sin. It takes courage to challenge your contemporary view of life and become willing to mold it into the likeness of the truth. That is what Myra has that you and Dawn lack...that is why neither you, Dawn, or Nick can defeat her..."

Edward then turned his attention to the fight, and noticed that Dawn was beginning to look weary, panting and sweating as she temporarily ceased her barrage of blows and jumped back to rethink her method of attack…

"I couldn't damage her…" she thought. "No matter how many punches and kicks I threw, she was able to block them all with her sword…"

She looked at the dark aura that was surrounding Myra's body, but what caught her attention more was the fact that unlike her, Myra didn't look tired at all…

"Not even someone who's delved into the spiritual world should be able to outlast all those attacks without breaking a sweat…" Dawn said to herself as she began to clench her fists tightly in anger. "I promised to end this battle quickly and I'm losing by attrition!"

"Take it easy." Myra interjected, noticing Dawn's frustration. "I don't intend on winning this by wearing you down. I know you wanted to see whose strength was superior by fighting me this way…"

It was then that Myra got into an offensive stance with her sword rather than a defensive stance, putting her left foot back and pulling back her left arm as she held out the sword with her right hand.

"So let's have this be what decides the match…" she continued. "One single attack from each of us. Whoever throws the more powerful attack wins."

"...So you want to go out as someone with guts and honor." Dawn replied, showing her agreeance with the proposal as she got into a fighting stance as well. "Despite who you are as a person, I'll at least respect you as a warrior when you're gone…"

"HHYYYAAAHHH!" the two let out a loud battle cry as they charged towards each other, with Myra intending to stab Dawn and Dawn intending to smack Myra in the chest hard enough to shatter her bones and vital organs. The winner of the exchange?

"BLURGH!" Myra hurled up blood as she felt the brute force of Dawn's fist pound against her lungs and heart, while the sword she had plunged through Dawn's chest had barely phased her with the protection she had from her aura.

Dawn. The winner of the battle?

"What?!" Dawn exclaimed in disbelief as she saw Myra bend over to let the blood spill from her mouth, not even letting go of her sword from the agony. "You're not dead _and_ you're still standing?!"

In response, Myra turned to Dawn, giving her a much more threatening glare than the one Dawn had given her earlier. Dawn was paralyzed with fear as she not only saw Myra's dark aura grow bigger, but also saw a glimmer of white light surrounding it as it spread from her body to her sword that was still stuck in her chest…

"I knew ahead of time that you were going to win that exchange…" she explained in a deep, demonic voice. "I didn't just let you win it to make you feel better. I also wanted to teach you through example a very important lesson about the terms of victory in a battle. No matter what happens, the victor...IS THE SURVIVOR!"

With that, Myra pulled her sword out of Dawn's chest, causing her to let out a cry of pain as the force of Myra's aura sent her flying back. Seeing this, Edward took immediate action and tried to catch her in his arms, but the force overpowered him and knocked him back as well as he caught her. The two were sent skidding across the ground, and eventually stopped sliding near a tent, where a young girl and a young boy came out to observe the two. After having a small bit of time to recuperate, Edward and Dawn picked themselves up and looked at the children, who asked them…

"Who are you two? What are you doing here?"

Edward and Dawn didn't respond, but looked up at the sky and began to reflect on what lead them here. Had the time come for them to look at the world in a new light?

"The light has arrived…" Myra said as she also looked up at the sky, and saw the ripple of light along with the descending bullet of flame. "...And it's time for me to claim it!"

Myra then spread her demon wings and flew up to the sky, grabbing the bullet with her right hand and crushing it in her fist. Doing this caused an explosion that had fire erupt all over her body, causing her immense pain, but she felt no compulsion to scream. All she did in response to this was reach toward the light with her left hand and absorb it into her body. It was then that the faint glow of light around her dark aura that Dawn had seen earlier grew brighter, and underneath her black, scaled demon wings, there grew a set of white, feathery angel wings. All the villagers came out of their tents, as they, Loki, and even Edward and Dawn marveled at the spectacle of Myra's newfound power. Myra then looked down at Loki, who smiled at her and said…

"Go. _Now_ you are ready to face him."

"Thank you Loki." Myra told him, despite her voice being distorted in her new form. "This only happened because of what you and all of them taught me…"

As Myra flew to the top of Phoenext where Nick awaited once again, Loki felt greatly satisfied. But Edward and Dawn were still confused.

"I still don't get where she gets all that power from…" Edward said to Loki.

"What did she mean by "all of them"?" Dawn asked Loki. "Was she talking about us too?"

"It's very simple…" Loki replied. "She means that she gets her power not from herself, but from the truth and all those inside of her who are unified by the truth."

 _Edward and Dawn have lost interest in completing their mission, and with the light of judgement gone, the village is in no impending danger. All that remains is one final duel...a rematch with not only Myra and Nick…_

Myra landed at the top of Phoenext where Nick stood, and both of them readied their weapons…

 _But with Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy…_

Now able to feel their vessels in the world of Myra Michaels preparing to battle once more, Twilight and Fluttershy floated down to the ground and reassumed their "physical" forms as "ordinary ponies".

 _Or at least that's all that should remain…_

Inside of Starcatch, King Nero growled as he begrudgingly stood back and watched Noimman be freed from her tank by "his master". As Noimman stepped out of the tank, she chuckled sinisterly to herself.

"Such a heartwarming family reunion this is." she remarked facetiously. "Seeing not only my son in my physical form again...but also my father…"

With that, Twilight remembered the star once more…

"GGGRRRAAAHHH!" she bellowed. "THAT BASTARD!"

"Huh?" Fluttershy responded as she dodged several powerful laser blasts Twilight shot from her horn and countered by flying towards her at light speed and delivering a flurry of punches to her stomach.

Likewise, in Myra's world, Nick fired several bullets from his gun at Myra. Myra dodged them all and flew towards Nick, delivering several sword slashes to him and finishing the barrage with a stinger to his chest, knocking him back as he gripped the ground on bended knee to stop himself from skidding. The bullets that came back at Myra, she deflected them with the beat of her wings.

"You…" Nick said in astonishment as Myra walked towards him. "You're far more formidable than before…"

"Please Nick…" Myra pleaded as she put away her sword and extended her right hand. "Let's end this now. I want to atone for what I've done to you. Earlier, I didn't have the courage to face my sins and wished to fight my punishment. But things are different now. We can compromise."

In Twilight's world, a similar situation was taking place, only theirs was moreso an impasse caused by the two sharing equal strength. Even after all of Fluttershy's punches, Twilight was not moved, and blasted Fluttershy with magic from her horn. But Fluttershy merely grinned and winked at Twilight as she fell to the ground. Then, without a moment's notice…

"?!" Fluttershy went as she looked up at Twilight, who was grinning smugly as she flew down to the ground, landing.

"What the fuck?!" she thought. "Why am I where Fluttershy should be and vice versa? Is this a body swap? A mind swap?"

"So tell me Fluttershy, how do you feel right now?" Twilight asked.

"I feel…" Fluttershy answered in a hesitant tone of voice. "...much more relaxed. I still feel the drive to fight you...but the hatred is gone...where did it all go?"

"To me, silly." Twilight replied, giggling to herself. "It's like, wow. No wonder you're so mentally unadjusted and manic all the time. You never let go of all this hate...or even your ego…"

"Oh, I'm so so sorry-" Fluttershy sincerely apologized before she put her hooves to her mouth. "Wh-what am I saying?! More importantly, why do I genuinely feel sorry?! I'm supposed to loathe correction! I'm supposed to believe I'm in the right no matter how sorry I make people think I am!"

"Haven't you figured it out yet?" Twilight mocked. "No, of course you've not. Now that I have your brain, I can see no memories of you discovering our greatest secret. The closest memory you have to something like that is being deceived by the traitor…that's why you were yelling earlier..."

Fluttershy squinted her eyes and scowled, finally recalling some of her anger.

"That's right…" she said seriously, gritting her teeth and preparing to attack again as she took flight. "I know who's really been pulling the strings. I still hate you, but I understand you now. You were just like me, only doing all these awful things because the traitor forced you into it!"

"Do you really believe that?" Twilight taunted again as Fluttershy lunged at her. "Such a fool…even becoming me couldn't help you see the truth..."

"Becoming you?" Fluttershy responded in confusion as she got ready to punch Twilight in the face. However, as Twilight winked at her, the two switched places once again…

"URGH!" Twilight grunted as the punch Fluttershy landed on her face had her spewing blood from her mouth. "WHAT THE HELL?! WHY?!"

"Because that trick that I do isn't a body swap or a mind swap…" Fluttershy explained with a confident smile on her face. "It's a body mind _soul_ swap…"

"You mean like Body Mind Soul summoning from the Lightening project?" Twilight remembered, having learned this from her robot self. "I thought that magic technique's only real purpose was to transform humans into exact clones of ponies, creating new lifeforms and weapons. In that transformation, the transformed leaves no trace of its original self. There's no swapping involved, it's just 1 becoming a different 1, not 2 becoming different 2s!"

"That's because what happens there is one subject becoming something completely new…" Fluttershy elaborated. "We do not become something new when I use this technique on us...for we are both entirely identical in body, mind, and soul..."

Twilight just stared at Fluttershy blankly, unable to process what she just heard from her…

"How is that possible?!" she yelled. "That can't be true! I'm Satan! You're God!"

"No, Twilight…" Fluttershy replied solemnly. "God is Satan and Satan is God..."

Twilight Sparkle felt the overwhelming pressure of a million thoughts and memories running through her head before she finally couldn't take it anymore. Finally, she put her hooves on her head and screamed with all her might…

"NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

Twilight started crying for some time as Fluttershy came over to comfort her. The two then slowly descended to the ground.

"You were right…" Twilight said, finally ready to concede for real. "I am a fool. I knew there was nothing to be gained by fighting you, but I was too blinded by my arrogance, too blinded by my hate to see that all this time, I was just fighting an endless, unwinnable battle with myself. I wanted to believe the traitor was responsible for my sins. But no. I was the one who killed Celestia and Luna. I was the one who created Noimman. I conspired, murdered, and gave birth to a terrible evil, all for this stupid and vain cause. I deserve to be sent straight back to hell for eternity..."

"No, no, no." Fluttershy replied. "That's not happening this time. You don't deserve to be in hell anymore, for you broke the chain that bound you to hell. You broke the illusion, and discovered the true nature of the hell you created. The rope has been cut and the book of life can now be written. You were hell, seeking to take heaven for your own, but what you didn't know is that you were also heaven. As we, our souls, exist eternally, we either view our eternal existence as one of pain or one of pleasure. So Twilight, would do you wish to view your eternal existence as?"

"...Pleasure...with my friends…" Twilight answered as she started gushing tears from her eyes. "THAT'S ALL I'VE EVER REALLY WANTED!"

"Then it shall be so…" Fluttershy told her. "As the ruler of darkness and the ruler of light, we shall do what darkness and light were meant to do…"

It was then that Twilight and Fluttershy became balls of darkness and light respectively once more, only this time when they rose up in the air, they had no intent to fight with each other, but to merge with each other…

 _Will Myra Michaels and Nick Rohn do the same…?_

Back in the world of Myra Michaels, Nick Rohn looked at the hand Myra had extended to him. He thought about taking it...before he saw the fire emitting from it. He then remembered the fire that was in Myra's eyes that day when he looked at her after she killed his parents, and gave her a glare of distrust as he said…

"Show me your other hand."

Myra complied and extended her left hand to him. Nick was stunned to see the light emitting from it, his look changing to one of marvel…

"Now do you see?" she said to him. "Even if one of these hands deceives you and causes you to fall from grace, the other hand will restore you to grace, with even greater glory if possible. You know the truth Nick. You know that these are no longer hands that wish to destroy, but hands that acknowledge the hell they have brought to so many, and wish to pull every soul they've put in that hell out of it, and back into the light! I don't care if you refuse to trust me and continue fighting me! Even if you are so stubborn to keep refusing me forever, I will keep coming after you forever! Because unlike the person I was back then, I REFUSE TO ABANDON YOU!"

"..." Nick paused for a long time before he finally smiled, reverting to his human form…

…..before pulling out his gun and firing a bullet from it at Myra's head. In response, Myra…

…..merely smiled and reverted back to human form as well, knowing full well that this was just a test. The bullet changed direction, instead traveling towards the light in her left hand, where it harmlessly dissolved and merged with the light. And…

…..so, that is the story of how Myra Michaels and Nick Rohn's bitter conflict ended. In a twist of irony, the same demon who caused Nick to fall in darkness was also the only angel who could bring him back to the light. The one who saves you may have a hand that can cast you into a realm of torture, but that one also has a hand that can drag you out of it and bring you into a realm of bliss. You can doubt that the hand you are given wishes to save you forever if you want...but you will know that it is true when it refuses to leave you forever…

It was later that day, when the sun was beginning to set, that Myra and Nick flew back to the village in their supernatural forms to visit Priest Loki, Edward Miles, and Dawn Dedde, who were all meditating in the shrine. Edward and Dawn were now confronting the darkness inside of themselves that they had long ignored, so that they could understand something like what Myra and Nick now knew…the light.

The End of Myra Michaels' Story.

 _Now that Myra's story has concluded, and all is well with Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy, it seems that this story may finally have a happy ending._

Ninja Time God Rarity said this as she and Fantasy God Discord saw a familiar figure approaching Fluttershy's mansion.

 _Oh ho, if only not for the loose ends that still need to be tied...as well as the many stories that have yet to be told…_

Fantasy God Discord said this as he and Ninja Time God Rarity allowed the figure to pass. The figure entered the courtyard and smiled when he saw that up above was a soul of light and darkness...a soul that couldn't get one thought out of it…

 _...Why are we not yet a complete form?_

"Excellent…" the figure said happily. "At long last, the ruler of the darkness and the ruler of the light have gathered as one…"

It was then that the figure was revealed to be Spike, as the combined form of Twilight and Fluttershy saw as they turned to look at him…

"Say no words and save your surprise…" Spike said. "I have much to discuss with you…"

"..." the merged soul obeyed, saying nothing in response despite being confused.

"Now that I've finished the story of Myra Michaels for you two, there's no reason for _us_ to continue this farce…" Spike told them. "I will merge with you both to complete _our_ form!"

"?!" the merged soul became shocked as they saw Spike's eyes turn red. He opened his mouth to allow the star to emerge from his body, causing him to slump to the ground.

"Hey, hey, I told you to save your surprise." the star reminded them. "You may not remember at the moment, but both of you have actually known about this from the very beginning, even before I visited you both while you were in meditation that night…"

"!" the merged soul realized what he meant.

"That's right," the star continued, knowing what they were thinking, "I only went under the alias Twilight's robot self gave me, "the traitor", because it served useful to our plans. I never betrayed either of you. Twilight was wrong both times. It wasn't her or I who killed Celestia and Luna and brought life to Noimman...it was _us_. Celestia and Luna were the only ones who were completely unaware of what was going on from start to finish, and we used that. We wanted to free them from their eternal torture, so we merged them into the one thing that can free Noimman from eternal torture. Truly, that will be a pleasurable existence for them…"

"?" the merged soul pondered something.

"Come on, it's not so hard to figure out." the star taunted. "I already explained to you on the night of your meditation the purpose of this convoluted plot. If you hadn't made yourselves forget what we had planned, there would have been no story. No struggle that would have made you as strong in the darkness and in the light as you are now, and no explanation about how we came to be. Our origin story can not say that we have simply just "always existed". Even the creator of the universe must explain how he was created, and we have decided that the best way to explain our past is to show that it is intertwined with the present and the future. We created time, fantasy, and reality itself. Thus, we are bound not by the rules of these creations."

"." the merged soul understood.

"Of course you understand this." the star said. "I just needed to remind you. After all, we are one being, the product of The Trinity…"

"!" the merged soul was more shocked than ever as it realized its fate.

"Now you know the truth…" the star finished as it finally began to merge with them, completing the merged soul's transformation. "You two are the other Eternal Three, and together, we are the ruler of the universe..."

"...now the spiriting can truly begin..."

Next is the story of Adrian Bruce…

...as well as the story of Noimman...


	11. Chapter 11

Episode 11: Answering the Call

 _Could we be…_

"Take that!" a woman with yellow-orange skin, red and punk-styled hair, and a blue sweatsuit exclaimed as she punched a thug who was armed with a knife in the face.

 _Answering her call…_

"Pussy!" she derided the armed thug behind her who tried to come from behind with a knife, countering with a back kick to his face.

 _Now…?_

"You're hardly better!" she exclaimed at the armed thug who jumped at her with a knife while she was busy taking care of the other thug, countering him with an uppercut as she propelled herself into the air and smacked him in the jaw. As she and the thug landed on the ground, she looked around and saw that a circle of thugs armed with guns had surrounded her.

"Oh, that is just as cheap as you can get." she remarked as they prepared to shoot her. "Unfortunately for you…"

"?!" the thugs went as they shot at her, only to see her vanish before their eyes. The next thing they knew, they were all down on the ground, feeling a surging pain in their legs.

"...I can fight low too." the woman finished, having done a blinding fast duck followed by a blinding fast and powerful sweep kick that went full circle. "Adrian Bruce is known for only complaining about "unfair tactics" for show…haven't you heard the word on the street?"

Looking at all the weapons that were scattered on the ground from the defeated lowlives, she got out a bag from her pocket and went around collecting them. In the midst of doing this, the Dark Sky members came out of the portal Fluttershy had sent them through, landing outside the alleyway that Adrian was in. Looking at the situation, the Dark Sky members came to the conclusion that now was not a good time to give Adrian the message.

"I...think our timing was bad." Ghost Rainbow Dash commented, looking at all the beaten up thugs and the weapons Adrian was picking up and putting in the bag.

"You're telling me," replied Derpy Hooves, "we missed some great action!"

"Come on…" Dumb-bell said as he and the rest of the gang moved away from the alley. "Let's talk to her when she's cooled down a bit…"

"Yeah, so long as she doesn't see us right now, we're good…"

"..." Score silently foreshadowed that the team had no idea they were making a terrible mistake, for that standoff Adrian was in…

...was no more than her regular morning workout routine. And while she came out of the alley with the bag over her shoulder, someone who they _did_ have to worry about seeing them happened to be walking down the same road…

*click* *click* *click*

That someone took several pictures of them with their digital camera. Looking at the pictures stored on the camera's memory, they laughed.

"So that's the help God has sent them…" she said to herself. "How embarrassing. Honestly, I thought you better than this…"

It was then shown that this person, a woman who had purple skin, purple hair with red and blue streaks in it and a ponytail, was wearing glasses, and was dressed in a blue button-up shirt with a black tie and black pants, was Noimman.

"...my father."

Adrian was on her way home to the Bruce manor. It was similar to Fluttershy's mansion, but was not as large. There was no pillar going an unimaginably long way up and the iron gates were silver rather than gold. Security proved to be tighter however, even with the front gate being guarded by a voice recognition/passcode lock rather than two gods. Adrian, despite being a resident of the place, would occasionally have trouble getting in and grow frustrated with the excessive protective measures.

"Man, that's dirty…" Adrian remarked, hating the voice recognition lock telling her "Access Denied" once again. "Changing the fucking passcode on me again without telling me. Why?! No one actually breaks into this shit besides expert hackers, and even they're just going to figure it out anyways with the technology we have now! Just look at what Felix does! Why does Dad have to be so goddamn paranoid?!"

"Though I also enjoy criticizing my father…" Noimman said ominously from behind. "I'm afraid this isn't your old man's fault. I ordered him to change the password to something much more befitting…"

"Befitting of what?" Adrian replied, bemused. "Actually, don't answer that, I really don't give a fuck less. Just give me the new password."

"So demanding and foulmouthed…" Noimman commented as she shrugged her shoulders. "Way to take advantage of the fact that you don't have to ask nicely, because I really don't have a choice but to give it to you."

"What did you expect?" Adrian retorted. "I don't like you and I just learned that you inconvenienced me. Worse yet, I'm now going to have to owe you a favor."

"Yay, motivation!" Noimman exclaimed in a sickly sweet tone of happiness as she pulled a white card out of her shirt pocket. "As a token of thanks for reminding me that I'm only doing this for myself, have this…"

Noimman handed the card she pulled to an annoyed Adrian, who grabbed it with her hand that was free from holding the bag. She read it to see that it said this…

 _No God is with us_

"Pfft, befitting…" Adrian jeered as she actually chuckled. "Our family's never been religious…"

"Ha ha ha ha ha…" Noimman laughed. "You won't be snickering when you witness the truth firsthand. The truth that your family has always been Satanic, and that you and your brother are a product of one of the rituals made in honor of the dark lord..."

Adrian kept up a smile to hide the fact that she was trying to restrain herself, putting Noimman's card in her pocket and crumpling it in her fist. Her hand was in the same pocket where she always carried around a pair of knuckle dusters and a 7-inch pocket knife, and she began gripping those to manage her anger...

"Oh, if only you weren't Dad's "friend"..." she thought to herself. "If you weren't, this would've gotten _real_ ugly…"

Adrian imagined putting on her dusters and breaking Noimman's jaw with a hook to her face, then smashing her head against the iron gate.

"Then I'd have you down on the ground, lapping up your own blood like the bitch you are…" she continued thinking. "...as I'd tell you the truth that you're about as appealing to everyone as a used tampon…"

*CLANG*

Adrian snapped back to reality upon hearing the gate shut behind Noimman after she entered the courtyard leading to the front doors of the mansion…

"Wha-damn it!" she exclaimed as she pulled the card out of her pants. "Before she went in, I wanted to see if this dumb password she gave me was even…"

Adrian paused when she realized that the card she was holding was in mint condition, even after she had crumpled it up.

"...At least I have a good feeling now that it'll work…" she said to herself, stunned.

Meanwhile, inside the mansion, Adrian's brother, Felix Bruce was in the middle of delivering a mock presentation to their parents, Cristo and Krysta Bruce. Felix's skin was an off-white color and his hair was black and curtained. He wore glasses with blue shades and despite looking like he was dressed to make an impression with his white, collared, button-up shirt and black pants, he actually favored a more casual attire, as shown by his plain white sport shirt that could be clearly seen under his unbuttoned collared shirt that he was wearing like a jacket. And despite his casual choice of clothing, he was not at all confident about this presentation, even though it was only his parents he was doing this for…

"So this is my latest…" he paused, holding up a beaker with a strange purple liquid inside, unsure of what the best word to describe it would be.

"...concoction?" he said in thought, wondering. "No, no, that sounds wrong...um...drug? Woah, hell no, that's even worse. Um...creation? Gah, but that's so cliche! I'd say invention, but that's even more stock and I don't feel it fits..."

"You...can just say chemical, son." Cristo finally said with a nervous chuckle. His skin was a blue color, and like Felix, he also had a curtained hairstyle, only with blonde hair, and glasses, only with silver shades instead of blue ones. He wore black leather pants and a black leather jacket over a red shirt.

"Nobody cares about your choice of words," interjected Krysta, who had tannish brown skin and a punk hairstyle like Adrian's, only brunette instead of red, and wore a white tank top and jeans, "they only care about how you come off to them."

As Felix looked at his parents, sitting on the couch in the living room, he only grew more nervous even though he knew they were only trying to comfort him.

"Great…" he said to himself as he let out a defeated sigh. "They don't want to say it to my face, but they're finding this just as embarrassing as I am, possibly more. Why did they have me do this? It's so dumb. Dad's the only one who's interested in this shit anyways, why couldn't I just show it to him in the lab…"

Unbeknownst to him, another scientist had been watching him the entire time...

"Sorry to end your suffering so soon…" Noimman intervened in Felix's presentation, speaking to him, making her presence known to the Bruces as she entered the living room. "But I'm afraid whatever you are doing right now needs to be put on hold for the time being. There's a matter I need to discuss with your father right away."

"Um...it's no trouble?" Felix nervously replied, smiling and looking over at his parents, futilely hoping for glances of approval on their faces. His expression quickly became blank when he saw they were frowning.

"Calm down…" he told himself in thought. "It's only because of Noimman, not because of my reaction. It doesn't matter if they know I never cared about that dumb presentation. Mom always gets pissed at Dad whenever Noimman's here, so I think I have a good enough diversion here regardless…"

Though not meticulous about his appearance, Felix always found himself fussing over what he might have done to inadvertently annoy others nonstop. As he went to his bedroom upstairs with the beaker in hand, looking to put it away with his chemistry set, Adrian came in with the bag she had gathered the weapons in and looked at her parents and Noimman.

"Uh, Adrian…" Cristo began to say before he was cut off by Adrian.

"Bad timing, I know." she said nonchalantly as she left the weapon bag on the TV table. "Just check out what I got whenever you get the chance."

Yes, Adrian's workout routine was not done in defiance of her parents' orders. On the contrary, it was done in compliance. Her father wanted to train her to be a mercenary because of her fearsome power, and when he learned of the street fights she would get involved in, he began requesting for her to bring back any weaponry the thugs may have had on them, so he could "put it to good use", so he claimed. Asking Adrian to loot them of money, he worried might come back to bite him, but confiscating an armed assailant's weapon could be easily justified for a good cause. Besides, the Bruce family had enough money from their ties to Noimman, who was high up in the government. Despite their wealth, however, Noimman did her best to ensure that their lives were anything but cushy…

"If you need me, I'll be upstairs…" she continued as she left the living room and went upstairs, getting out her knife and unfolding it when she was well out of their view. "...waiting for the storm to clear…"

Soon, Noimman was having a discussion with Cristo and Krysta in the living room, making herself comfy in the master chair she felt entitled to.

"Glad to have you here, Noimman…" Cristo said with a smile, feigning politeness. "Would you like any refreshments?"

"You know I never care to have refreshments when I come over here." Noimman replied. "Just watching your reactions to the lovely atmosphere I bring to this place is refreshing enough…"

Noimman's said that while grinning cheekily at Krysta, who was giving her the evil eye…

"Just tell us what brought you here…" Krysta said through her gritted teeth, not caring in pretending to be happy to see her.

"I'd rather show it…" Noimman replied in a foreboding tone.

She then began humming to herself as she reached into her pants and began fiddling around for a little while before the sound of something being pulled out could be heard. A mist of dark energy began to pour out of her pants, making Cristo and Krysta feel uneasy, but giving Noimman pleasure…

"Ah...I love getting the opportunity to let it all out…" she said in ecstasy as the dark mist materialized into a sheet of paper that she took in hand and held out to Cristo. "Especially from my legs...they haven't been the same since then…"

"I...hope you recover from whatever happened soon…" an unnerved Cristo replied as he grabbed the paper Noimman gave him. When he and his wife read what was on it, their unease turned to shock. They looked back at Noimman, who had her hand in her pants again. This time, the sound of something being screwed back into place could be heard before she got up.

"I'd tell you to "think it over"," said Noimman cockily, "but we both know that it's an offer you can't refuse. Even the school is only a cover for a place I'm sure you're both familiar with. I want both of them to come back to the place where everything began…"

Noimman didn't even say goodbye, or anything after that. She just left, muttering something odd to herself…

"Solve my riddle…solve my riddle where no God is with us lives...see who pulls her strings...then reel in the true evil..."

Krysta clenched her fists and growled. As soon as Noimman was gone, she snatched the paper out of Cristo's hands and tore it up.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" Cristo yelled.

"NOT A CHANCE!" Krysta bellowed. "WE ARE NOT SENDING OUR KIDS TO ANY PLACE WHERE THAT CUNT CAN HAVE HER WAY WITH THEM!"

Noimman chuckled evilly to herself as she overheard the two fighting from the courtyard.

"I'd love to stay and listen…" she said. "But I need to keep an eye on those Dark Sky members. Pitiful as they may be, my father is notorious for turning the weak into legends that put the strong to shame. I'll have Akame fill in for me tomorrow so I can keep busy on that...but that doesn't mean I won't stop for a surprise visit at any time...ha ha ha ha ha…"

Adrian and Felix, by contrast, were trying to find ways to deal with their frustration as they overheard their parents fighting. Adrian was under her bed with her knife, carving obscene words into the wooden frame that supported it.

"Fuck, shit, damn, hell, pussy, cock, dick, cunt…" she said, reciting the obscenities. "I think I pretty much got every swear word in the book, discounting the ones that aren't PC. Wait, why the hell do I care?! I'm going to be in deep shit if they ever find this anyway!"

As for Felix, he was on the computer, wearing headphones as he was listening to punk rock music.

"When you're listening to punk rock to clear your mind of your problems…" he mused. "...and then you can't stop thinking about why so many people don't like punk rock. I hate my brain…"

He then pulled his chemistry set closer to him and took out the liquid he showed his parents earlier.

"Which is why I got into making things like this…" he said before he took a swig of it.

Meanwhile, the tension between Krysta and Cristo downstairs was beginning to subside…

"Honey, you know I don't like it when we fight…" Cristo tried to calmly reason with her. "I'm not forcing the kids to do something for me. This is about their future, and the family's future."

"But what if Noimman kills them?!" Krysta exclaimed. "Tortures them and rapes them to death?! I know you're not stupid enough to believe that she'll take it easy on them because they're your kids. To them, she's just your boss. How do you think they're going to take it when they learn just how diabolical she really is?!"

"They need to know the truth." Cristo replied solemnly. "They need to know where they came from. You know they need to know...but we're not going to have them die for it. To prove to you that they will not die, I'm going to make one more unbreakable pact...with Noimman's most hated enemy…"

"...Not unless I'm in on it too." Krysta finally said after a long pause, holding out her fist. Cristo answered this gesture by holding out his fist as well and giving hers a bump.

"For the first time," continued Krysta, "I feel like you're going to make me truly grateful that I coughed up the red pill that night…"

 _The next morning, Adrian Bruce and her brother Felix found themselves at "prison work school". Like all mortals, they did not muse too much over how they ended up there, even as a familiar paper fluttered behind them, blown by the wind. They merely saw this as following the direction of the wind…though before entering the school, they first looked towards the sky and admired all of the blue...even knowing that it would eventually become dark…_

Meanwhile, the Dark Sky members were staying in a hotel room and talking amongst themselves after they had gotten out of bed that morning. Dumb-bell yawned, awakening from a less than refreshing sleep in the same bed as Hoops.

"Uh...shit, man…" he mumbled in discontent as he got out of the bed. "God, that had to be the most uncomfortable sleep I've ever had."

"Dare I ask what made it _ssoooo_ unpleasant?" Ghost Rainbow Dash snarked, hovering in the middle of the room, lacking empathy from not needing sleep as a ghost.

"Hoops not knowing that there's this magical thing called courtesy," answered Dumb-bell, his tone becoming snide, "and staying on your side of the bed that we were supposed to _share_."

"Hey, I heard that!" Hoops exclaimed as he got up. "Don't start that whiny crap with me, dude. You know that there's this magical thing called the body's instinct!"

"I don't know about you guys," interjected Derpy Hooves as she and Score got up, "but I slept great with Score last night!"

Dumb-bell and G.R.D. began chuckling to themselves while a slightly concerned Hoops asked…

"Wait, you two didn't actually try anything, right?"

"..." Score silently denied this allegation.

"I tried something last night." Derpy admitted. "I was just playing with the TV remote underneath the covers."

"Bwa ha ha ha ha!" G.R.D. burst out laughing. "Oh, you guys are too entertaining…"

"Come to think of it, how do we know _you_ didn't try anything last night?" a suspicious Hoops speculated, causing a now nervous G.R.D. to stop laughing. Her eyes dotted around, seeing everyone giving her suspicious glares.

"Hmph!" she exclaimed, crossing her arms, shutting her eyes, and turning her head. "I did nothing you can prove!"

"Whatever…" Dumb-bell retorted, shrugging it off as he went to the bathroom, where everyone in the room could now see traces of ectoplasm stuck in the fur on his backside...along with Hoops' hoof prints…

"Oh no, bro…" Hoops and Ghost Rainbow Dash said simultaneously as they examined their front hooves and realized ectoplasm was dripping from them…

Even though that was bad enough, they didn't realize that worse things awaited them…

"Ha ha ha ha ha…" Noimman laughed, standing outside the hotel they were staying at...


	12. Chapter 12

Episode 12: Knowing the Hunter

 _When we are imprisoned, we work and we learn. When we are at work, we can feel like we are in a prison learning about the hardship of life. When we are at school, working hard, we can feel like we are doing it to escape a certain kind of prison…_

… _but what we don't know is that prison is either everywhere or nowhere…_

Later on in the morning, the Dark Sky members were still at the hotel, sitting around a table and eating breakfast. Oddly enough, they were the only ones there...

"Awww…" Derpy Hooves bemoaned. "I wanted breakfast in bed…"

"Ha ha ha..." Dumb-bell laughed in a feigned manner. "And I want to be anywhere but in bed after this morning's fiasco…"

"Please dude," pleaded Hoops, "I said I was sorry. Can we not have this damper our morning?"

"I admit it," interjected Ghost Rainbow Dash in a tone of sincere remorse, "I took that prank too far. Can we please forget about it now?"

"Sure…" Dumb-bell replied facetiously. "And we may as well forget about the next prank you'll pull that will "go too far" while we're at it, because it's apparent you're never going to change."

"For fuck's sake!" G.R.D. exclaimed defensively. "It was one prank!"

"..." Score silently pointed out that G.R.D. was wrong with a flashback to another prank she pulled just the night before when they checked in.

In the flashback, Derpy Hooves was eyeing the fridge they had in their room with interest, but before she could take out one of the cans of soda, Hoops intervened.

"Sorry Derpy, no." he told her. "Those drinks are stupidly overpriced. I don't want you wasting your money."

As Hoops and Derpy trotted away from the fridge, she looked at the can of Coca-Cola she wanted from the transparent door and said in a crestfallen tone…

"I love Coke…"

All of a sudden, the music from that old Chef Boyardee commercial started playing as the fridge door opened by itself, and the can rolled towards Derpy. Feeling it bump against her back hooves, Derpy turned around and gasped with joy. But when she picked it up, G.R.D. came out of the can.

"That'll be thirty-seven dollars." G.R.D. taunted her.

Derpy gasped in horror...at the high price.

"Hoops, the economy is broken from the apocalypse!" she cried as she tossed the can aside and ran to Hoops.

"What, again?" he retorted.

After the flashback ended, Score silently explained the irony of the situation. The can Derpy threw was damaged from the impact, getting soda all over the carpet. The cost to clean the carpet would probably be the same amount of money the hotel had put on the soda. But in spite of his attempt to bring up what happened as an amusing anecdote, no one else seemed to find it funny...except G.R.D..

"Come on," said G.R.D. nonchalantly, "you gotta agree with me, that was a pretty good gag."

"It's not a "PRETTY GOOD GAG" if you're making it at our expense!" Dumb-bell exclaimed, growing more frustrated.

"Jesus Christ, man…" G.R.D. remarked, seeing Dumb-bell grow red in the face. "You look like you're ready to crack over a joke about Coke."

"Fuck this, I'm out!" Dumb-bell yelled as he left the table in a huff. "You want to laugh at everyone's expenses so badly, you can laugh at the hotel bill!"

Dumb-bell began angrily muttering to himself as he went upstairs to pack his bags, while the rest of the gang didn't know what else to do besides muse over what just happened.

"I just don't get what he's so upset about…" G.R.D. said in confusion, shrugging her shoulders. "He knows the way I am."

"He's probably just been really stressed recently because of you-know-what…" Hoops surmised, unaware that you-know-who was approaching. "It does get grating, Fluttershy treating us like her subjects when she's supposed to be our friend. With all the shit that's going on right now, she puts us at the kid's table? Delivering a message? Really? I don't feel any more motivated to complete this lame mission than he does."

"Yeah!" Derpy interjected, trying to be cool, as the rest of the Dark Sky members went quiet upon seeing who was now standing over the breakfast table. "I say we take matters into our own hands and fight Noimman ourselves!"

"..." Score silently warned Derpy that now was as good a time as any to change her stance…

...because Noimman was looming over the breakfast table, wearing a malicious grin on her face. Derpy was now quiet too as she and the others began shaking in fear.

"Don't worry…" she said sarcastically. "I'll take care of the check. And then I'll take care of you…"

Meanwhile, Dumb-bell was packing his things in a suitcase, still displeased with the current state of affairs.

"We're going up against someone far more threatening than we ever thought possible and it's all just a joke to everybody!" he muttered angrily. "First, Fluttershy bails on us. Says we should just "give the heroes a message" instead of joining them in battle because it's NOT OUR BUSINESS YET. Then we find out that one of these heroes is getting into a street fight and taking people's weapons as spoils of war? Gee, I just wish GOD of all beings would make things clear and simple for us!"

"So do I…" Noimman said ominously from behind, frightening Dumb-bell, who stumbled back and fell on the bed in shock. "Oh dear, don't tempt me. When I see someone trembling so anxiously on a bed, I can't help but feel...ecstatic."

"WHAT DID YOU DO TO THE OTHERS?!" Dumb-bell bellowed.

"I stored them safely inside the compartment of this arm…" Noimman explained as she held out her left arm. "But that doesn't mean I can't put you in another place that's more comfortable for me…"

"RRRAAAHHH!" Dumb-bell cried as he tried to grab Noimman's arm and tear it off. In response, however, Noimman pulled her left arm back in time and grabbed Dumb-bell's front hooves, squeezing them tightly.

"Grrrr…" Dumb-bell grunted, struggling. "You're not taking off my forelegs…"

But before he knew it, Dumb-bell felt something else get taken off as Noimman held something in front of him that was dripping with blood in her right fist.

"Why do I feel so much agony…" he remarked, his voice growing weaker. "It feels like a pack of bees are stinging my brain...yet it also feels so cold down there…"

Dumb-bell then gasped when he saw Noimman open her fist and reveal to him the penis she had ripped off his body. It was only seconds later that he saw her crush it in her hand. Fainting from the shock, he collapsed on the bed, where Noimman cruelly poured the blood and testicular fluid that was left in her hand on his face. Cheerfully scattering the remains of the flesh, she looked at the massive wound that was left from his torn penis.

"Fear not." she said, in a facetious manner as always, reaching into her pants. "I'll be sure to patch up that hole...with another hole…"

When Dumb-bell awoke later, he found himself inside of a pitch-black darkness.

"Hello?!" he called out. "Score?! Derpy?! Hoops?! Dash?! Where are you?!"

Then he remembered what Noimman said about putting him in another place...and what she did to his penis…

"No…" he said as he looked down at his former manhood and was terrified to see that in its place...was a vagina.

"NNNNNOOOOO!" he bellowed.

Noimman cackled evilly to herself, hearing him scream inside of her as she left the hotel…

"What a weakling." she scoffed at him. "I went easy on him and his friends because they were the children of God. There truly is no greater punishment than that."

She said this as she passed by a window in a store and stopped to look at her reflection.

"Now if they were _my_ children…" she said in a demonic voice as she saw the reflection change to show her in the form of pure darkness, holding strings in one hand that she held out in front, and in the other hand that she held out from behind, which were connected to four other forms of pure darkness.

"...this would've gotten a lot darker…" she finished as she walked away from the mysterious silhouettes of four men.

Meanwhile, at the school, Adrian and Felix Bruce pushed open the double doors to the school and entered. What laid ahead of them was a long hall, with many people on both sides looking through their lockers. While Adrian and Felix hoped everyone would be too preoccupied to notice their entrance, a sizable crowd of young adults were standing in front of them, shooting them unwelcoming glares.

"Oh boy…" Felix nervously mumbled to himself, still holding the door he had opened. "I think it would be wise to shut this door as quietly as possible…"

Though he gently put his door back in its place, Adrian slammed hers as hard as she could and pressed her right fist into her other hand.

"I hope you mooks just have poor social skills…" Adrian remarked as she made her gesture that she was ready to fight if she had to. "...because there's no way in hell we're putting up with any freshman hazing…"

After she said that, however, she, Felix, and the people blocking their way all heard the sound of two jingle bells ringing. Before long, a pool of pure darkness suddenly appeared on the white, tiled floor. The darkness that came out of it materialized into a woman that shared Noimman's uniform and body structure. Adrian and Felix were surprised by how much she looked like Noimman, almost mistaking her for the aforementioned at first, but quickly noticed the differences in her clothing, hairstyle, and skin tone. This woman's shirt was red rather than blue, her hair was black and long with spiky bangs, and her skin was gray. Discounting that, however, as Adrian and Felix saw that she even wore glasses, which were black, they knew her similar physical appearance was not a coincidence.

"Hey, hey, hold your horses." she told them as she jingled her silver bells, one of which had the insignia of a six-headed serpent, and the other, the insignia of a judge with a white hat and a pen. "These guys aren't looking for a fight."

"We're not?" one guy with red, blue-streaked hair in the crowd blocking the way responded in a mechanical tone of voice.

"I don't like your tone…" the woman said as she began to jingle the bells again.

"We're not!" the guy exclaimed as he and the rest of the crowd walked away.

As they were walking away, the guy caught sight of a woman he found attractive standing by an open locker, looking inside. The woman had a bleach white skin color and a pompadour hairstyle that showed off the crazy combination of green, pink, and blue colors in her hair. For clothing, she wore black parachute pants and a brown leather jacket that she wore over a black suspender vest that also acted as a bra. With nothing under it, the guy was intrigued to see the woman's large breasts hanging...before he saw her smile evilly in the mirror of the locker door...

"Sorry about that," apologized the mysterious woman who emerged from the darkness, "it unfortunately happens a lot here, newcomers being given a cold welcome. My name is Akame. I'm the vice principal of this establishment, Hardnox Institute. What are your names?"

"...I'm Adrian and this is Felix." Adrian answered, gesturing to herself and Felix. She only provided her with their first names, hesitant to give anyone their full names out of distrust.

"So I guess you're like me," joked Akame, "no last name. Makes sense. I always knew Bruce was a first name…"

"Damn!" Adrian thought. "How did she-"

"I told you the truth." Akame said in an assuring tone. "I'm the vice principal of this school and I'm filling in for the regular principal, Noimman, in her absence. She's told me all about you two, and I must say, I'm fascinated by your potential. Otherwise, Noimman would never have granted you the prestigious opportunity that she has..."

Akame rang her bells again, and with that, another pool of darkness emerged from the floor. Putting her bells away in her shirt pocket, she crouched down and pulled a green duffel bag out, the pool disappearing behind it. Opening it, she got out two red cans that looked like soda cans.

"Why don't we drink to celebrate your accomplishment?" she offered as she handed the two cans she got out to the puzzled Adrian and Felix, who took them in hand, accepting the offer as to not make a scene.

Suddenly, however, just as Akame was about to get a drink for herself out of the bag, a deafening shriek of terror could be heard from down the hallway.

"YYYYYAAAAAHHHHH!" the guy who took notice of the woman earlier screamed after having his eyes gouged out. "MY EYES!"

"MWA HA HA HA HA!" the woman laughed loudly in a cartoonish manner, sounding like a man imitating the stereotypical, suave accent of a lady of the upper class. "Now you can't see them…"

She said this as she dropped the eyes in between her breasts, and then squished her breasts together to crush his eyes into a bloody pulp.

"Now you can't see with them ever again!" she declared. "Don't lay your eyes on the prize if it's a booby prize!"

Everyone who witnessed this awful scene groaned in disgust…

"Self-awareness is not automatically funny!" the woman abruptly shouted. "Look at me, I'm yelling! I'm yelling about yelling! I'm yelling about yelling about yelling! Now I'm trapped in an infinite loop! Don't you see? Insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result! That's what self-awareness is, insanity! You're insane if you know you're insane!"

"Aw shit…" Akame grumbled, putting her hand on her face. "She's at it again. That's Crazy Celes, pulling her usual stunts."

"It's usual for her to gouge a dude's eyes out?!" Felix exclaimed. "How has she not been expelled yet?!"

"Don't you know?" Akame retorted. "This isn't just a school. It's a prison work school, a secret experiment Noimman is conducting to test the capabilities of the inhabitants of this world that were put here after the apocalypse that took place in the Transcending project. Because this world is now highly underpopulated, it was extremely easy to gather every prisoner, worker, and student here all under one roof. The government wants to see how all of said faction of human society would react to having to live together in prison as one. Obviously, you should still keep your distance from people like Crazy Celes. Nobody likes them."

"Transcending project?" Felix asked in confusion. "I didn't even know there was an apocalypse…"

"Not just that," interjected Adrian, having a hard time taking any of this seriously, "but we're not prisoners, we've never worked for an actual business, and Felix and I were homeschooled. What purpose do we have for being here if we don't meet the government's criteria?"

"Because you're not here for the same purpose as all the other "riff-raff", Noimman likes to say." Akame explained. "You have a special mission. It should have been explained on the paper your parents got. Didn't they ever show it to you?"

"...Son of a bitch…" Adrian and Felix said in frustration to themselves as they realized that their parents deliberately concealed important information from them.

"Excuse me for skipping the toast," said Akame as she got out a first aid kit from the duffel bag instead of her drink, "but I've got a patient to treat. It's part of my job to help these students out when they get hurt after things get _too_ wild…"

As Akame walked back over to the injured student, she got a chill down her spine when she felt the unpleasant presence of another dangerous student who was strolling around the hall. It was Yata, a man with short and wavy black hair, black pants, and a black shirt that had the symbol of the sun on it. He always had a creepy grin etched on his face, and even more unsettling were the three syringes, the kind used in abortions, stuck in his head. One was on his forehead, the other two were on his cheeks, one for each side. All of them were oozing out a purple aura of dark, oppressive energy, which kept most from wanting to go anywhere near him. Akame became especially uncomfortable when he turned to her and started saying in a chilling tone of voice…

"My brothers...I know what happened to my brothers…"

Akame shivered and started walking by really slowly as to not accidentally sound the bells that were in her shirt pocket.

"Poor kids…" Yata said in thought as he saw Adrian drinking the beverage Akame gave her, while Felix was pouring his into a beaker with a stick embedded on the side. "Akame's found herself a nice couple of pawns to kill the king…"

Yata then looked over at Akame putting a pair of robotic eyes into the student's empty sockets and snickered when he noticed that Celes had disappeared from her spot.

"Test results show…" Felix said as he observed the stick on the beaker, which turned out to be an electronic reader. "...no toxins of any variety. I guess she really did just want to have a drink with us."

"I'm weirdly disappointed." Adrian interjected as she finished her drink. "I was hoping to show off my body's resistance to poison. Oh well…"

Adrian crumpled up the can and tossed it on the floor, which caught the eye of Crazy Celes.

"HEY!" she screamed. "YOU CAN'T JUST THROW TRASH ON THE FLOOR! THAT'S A $500 PARKING TICKET RIGHT THERE! WHAT IF THE HANDICAPPED WANTED THAT SPACE OF THE FLOOR?!"

"If you can commit acts of violence without consequence, what's so bad about me littering?" Adrian asked.

"THERE ARE PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN SHOT FOR LITTERING!" Celes continued shouting. "POLICE BRUTALITY IS REALER THAN YOU, SPONGEBOOBS! PAY ME THE FINE OR ELSE I'LL MAKE YOU PAY!"

"Whoa hoa hoa, that sounds like a threat to me…" Adrian retorted as she pulled out her knife. "And I reserve the right to defend myself…"

But Celes didn't assault Adrian or try to rob her in a tussle. Instead, she waved her right hand, which was glowing with a white aura around it, and Adrian's wallet left her front left pocket, floating right into Celes' hand.

"Ha!" Celes taunted Adrian as she buried the wallet in between her breasts. "I don't care about actually fighting for anything, so long as I get paid!"

Adrian just smirked as she cut the two strings that held up Celes' suspender vest with a swift stroke of her knife, making a slash on the upper area of her chest above her breasts. The vest fell off, and Adrian's wallet fell to the floor, along with the remains of the guy's eyes. Adrian's confident smile turned to a frown of disgust when she grabbed the wallet out of the bloody pulp.

"Serves you right for giving me such unnecessary exposure!" Celes boasted, even with her chest bleeding, the blood dripping down to her breasts hanging in the air. "All you get in the end is blood money!"

"No…" Adrian said in frustration through her teeth. "The greatest satisfaction is getting to mop the FLOOR WITH YOU!"

She then tripped Celes on her front side with a sweep kick to her legs, put her leg on her back, and sent her sliding across the hall. The blood from her chest tracked all across the floor before she finally crashed into a door headfirst. Everyone besides Yata and Akame was now giving Adrian and Felix a blank stare. Having no idea how to react, Felix just quietly hid the beverage Akame gave him in his coat and bristled the hair on the back of his neck. Adrian, surprised by her greater strength than normal of how she kicked Celes all that way, decided to just play along with it…

"If any of you ever try to fuck with us, you'll get what she got!" she proclaimed in a brazen tone of voice. "Comprendes?!"

Meanwhile, Yata and Akame were more interested in the power Adrian displayed as they looked over at Celes.

"Incredible power…" Yata admired the situation in thought. "But it's not enough for Noimman or even a lower-ranked demon god for that matter, hee hee ha…"

"I can see it's already starting to take effect…" Akame happily said to herself as the student she finished fixing up opened his new robotic eyes ominously.

Adrian and Felix were looking at Celes too, only with concern. But as Celes pulled herself off the ground with ease, only feeling dizzy from the damage, their concern turned to shock.

"Ooooohhhhh…" Celes grumbled as she put her hand to her bleeding forehead. "I have such a headache. I guess that's what happens though when you get smashed!"

Adrian and Felix were slack-jawed. What in the world was up with these people?! As they pondered that, the piece of paper that was fluttering outside earlier found itself stuck on one of the classroom windows. One could see that the paper was actually a "WANTED" poster…

...with Noimman's face on it…


	13. Chapter 13

Episode 13: An Objective Look

 _Yin and Yang, light and darkness. Growing stronger through suffering is only the first step. The next step that is needed is to combine the light and darkness inside of you. To do this, one must understand the god that is with them and the devil that is with them. But what do we do if no God is with us, period?_

 _...Is it all over? No._

 _No. God will absorb the darkness from the explosion and stop the devil from creating new roots. This will be clear when the three are pulled out._

"Just let a drop of blood fall on that card I gave you…" Noimman said to herself as she came closer to the prison work school...

Dumb-bell, who had passed out inside of Noimman's groin compartment, was beginning to awaken.

"I feel like I've only been asleep in this darkness for hours," he said as he looked all around him and saw nothing but black, "but I may as well have been asleep for days, maybe even weeks and months. Years? Who knows. Not that it matters, all of us are already dead."

Dumb-bell thought back to when he and the gang first came together after they died. He remembered the first time they performed for someone other than Princess Celestia. How they introduced themselves to Rarity and then Derpy Hooves messed everything up by quoting a stale meme.

"Ha ha ha," laughed Dumb-bell, "it's easy to look back on stuff like that now and say, "Ah, the good ol' days.". But unfortunately, looking at it from an objective perspective shows that those days really weren't so good. That was the same night we had our first "apocalypse", followed by Fluttershy having to become a god, and now…"

Dumb-bell cringed as he remembered Rarity making fun of him for looking like a lady.

"That would be more appropriate than ever right now…" he begrudgingly admitted. "I can't blame this on Ninja Time God Rarity either because Noimman wasn't created by her or Fantasy God Discord. They can't do anything to help us. We really are fucked this time…"

 _Hey, don't talk like that. We're the ones who decide when you get fucked._

Dumb-bell's eyes popped open as he heard NTG Rarity saying those words in his mind.

 _You're not fucked until you get laid to rest, ho ho!_

"Rarity?! Discord?!" Dumb-bell exclaimed upon hearing FG Discord talking in his mind now too. "You can reach us, even in here? I thought you had no control over Noimman or anything she did!"

 _That much is true, for Noimman was created by The Eternal Three. But we can only do nothing to her, it doesn't affect what we can do with you._

"But shouldn't being captivated by her prevent us from hearing you?" Dumb-bell asked. "I mean, if we're inside of her, and we're part of her true form now…"

 _You're only inside of Noimman's body. The darkness that surrounds you is only the extension of her true form._

"So what's going on here?" Dumb-bell replied. "What is Noimman, really? Why is her true form not inside of her body?"

 _Because Noimman's true form only oversees everything as she controls her body from the shadows…_

Dumb-bell gasped as he realized the secret of Noimman's true identity.

"That's it!" he exclaimed. "I know how Noimman can be defeated! I have to tell the others right away!"

 _They already know, ha ha. We talked to them first. We just held off on telling you because we wanted to see your reaction._

"I'd be irritated if I wasn't so ecstatic!" Dumb-bell retorted happily. "I finally get it now, why Fluttershy did things this way! She wanted us to hold off on telling Adrian the message right away, because if we did at the time, there would have been no reason for her to believe us. She wanted us to get caught by Noimman and put inside of her body, because this ensures that we'll be close to Adrian when the time comes to fight Noimman, a time where she'll need to listen to our message and believe us in order to defeat her! All we have to do is train here until we're strong enough to break out of here!"

 _Smart thinking...but that's only half of it. Keep in mind that Noimman isn't stupid either. She already knows that you're going to try to increase your strength in order to break out of here._

"Hmm?" Dumb-bell went, confused. "Then why did she trap us in here in the first place?"

 _Think carefully, Dumb-bell. When you and the Dark Sky members come together, you form a holy dragon, a creature of light. And Noimman is of darkness. Do the math._

"...Oh yeah...that bitch!" Dumb-bell yelled in frustration. "So that's why she split us up! We can't use that power, but she can harness it from us! To break out of here, we need to be together! Dammit! Come on, Adrian! We need you!"

Unfortunately for the Dark Sky members, Adrian Bruce wasn't going to be rescuing them just yet...because for the time being, she was stuck inside of a classroom. She was pretending to write notes in her notebook when she was actually writing obscene words to vent her frustration with the dreadful lesson being taught to her by none other than Crazy Celes…

"And that is how Robot Alicorn Twilight and I singlehandedly exterminated the human race!" Crazy Celes boasted to the classroom. She had changed out of her street clothes and was now wearing a teacher's uniform of a white button-up shirt and black pants. She also had a teacher's stick that she was using to point to a drawing of a crudely drawn Twilight Sparkle with a crudely drawn boy standing under a professionally drawn head portrait of her. "Any questions? Comments? Quips?"

The entire classroom just blankly stared at her, save Adrian, who started writing something new on a blank sheet of paper in her notebook.

"What?!" Celes exclaimed angrily, unhappy with the classroom's reaction. "What are your eyes firmly locked on me for?! This isn't driving school, and I am not the road!"

The people in the class kept staring as Adrian finished what she was writing.

"History is dark and warped, okay?!" Celes yelled. "What, did you think we were only going to get rid of all the white guys?! It really speaks volumes when Chester Cheeto's granddaughter was the only one who took notes from this!"

Celes said that while pointing her teacher's stick at Adrian, leading the class to turn to face her.

"Yes," replied Adrian facetiously as she tore the page she had just written on from her notebook, "and I have some very valuable input to offer you…"

Adrian then held up the page for Celes and the whole class to see. It read, "GO FUCK YOURSELF".

"Oh my…" Celes responded in astonishment with a look of horror on her face that abruptly became a look of cheer. "That is very valuable input!"

Adrian got a look of confusion on her face as the rest of the class began murmuring in puzzlement over her sudden shift to a jubilant attitude. Things became even more perplexing when Crazy Celes' voice boomed on the intercom…

"MRS. CELES, TO THE PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE! MRS. CELES, COME TO THE PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE THIS INSTANT!"

"Well, have a good life, everyone!" Celes exclaimed as she casually strolled out of the classroom. "Just remember, you'd rather be in detention than in the detention center!"

After she left, the class just sat there in dead silence before someone said…

"So...does this mean class is over?"

"Uuuggghhh…" Adrian groaned as she slumped her head on her desk. "I hate this place…why the hell do we have to be here? It's not like I'm learning anything, so what's the goddamn point?"

 _Everything has a point, Adrian. Just because your school doesn't teach you anything that interests you or makes you feel there's a point to life beyond just living doesn't mean you have to be stuck working in prison. It just means you have to look at things from a different angle...find a new window of opportunity…_

"Huh?" Adrian said to herself as something stuck in the window to her left caught her eye. As she left her desk to get a closer look at it, the ominous chuckling of Yata could be heard from outside the classroom…it seemed as if he was getting ready to take the syringes out of his head...

Meanwhile, in another classroom, Felix was having an "afterschool session" with Akame. Only he was left in the classroom as Akame was asking him some questions.

"So Felix," said Akame in a sweet tone of voice, "how did you enjoy my lesson?"

"It was okay." Felix replied bluntly.

"Ho ho ho," laughed Akame, looking right through him, "it wasn't. I could tell you were bored the entire time."

"I'm serious," insisted Felix, "it was okay. Just because I wasn't into it doesn't mean it was a badly put together lesson or anything."

"Wow," replied Akame, impressed with his politeness, "even after I gave you the "okay" to be brutally honest. You're not just a poser, you genuinely are a humble and nice guy."

"..." Felix paused before letting out a sigh. "No, I'm not humble or nice. It's just a natural habit for me to try and be as diplomatic as possible, regardless of situation."

"What are you going on about?" Akame asked with a bemused expression on her face. "If you weren't genuinely nice, you wouldn't prune yourself to make that a natural habit to begin with."

"Well…" Felix answered. "It's difficult to explain because you only see what goes on with the outside of me, not the inside of me. I can't help it, but I'm always thinking of things that I feel no human being should ever think of. I don't want to go any further than that…"

"Oh, but I do…" Akame said, now wearing a serious expression as she got out her bells from her shirt pocket and began ringing them in her left hand. "I'm all too familiar with "things no human being should ever think of"...because I'm not exactly human…"

Becoming uncomfortable as Akame came closer to him, Felix quickly reached into his coat pocket to grab the drink Akame had given him earlier...only to find that it was gone.

"So you haven't drunk yours yet…" Akame commented as Felix looked up at her and was surprised to see her holding a small, black snake in her left hand, which vanished to reveal the drink. "You really should. Just like it gave your sister the strength to stand up against Crazy Celes as you saw, it will grant your mind extraordinary power to stand up against what has been plaguing it for so long…"

"...Yeah." Felix finally said after another pause. "To be honest though, I kind of already figured that out. That's the field I'm in, researching chemicals in an attempt to create things that will not only enhance people's strength in combat, but also enhance their minds."

"I can relate to that," replied Akame with a wink, "for I have always been into a very similar kind of research. But I was never satisfied with merely tempering people's bodies and minds, no. Even now, as I no longer subscribe to evil, my interest in tempering others' souls has not at all waned."

"...Evil?" Felix asked.

"Now, don't pretend to be surprised." Akame answered as she moved in closer and put her hands on his cheeks. "You knew the whole time. That there was no way I couldn't have been evil at one point. Do you know where my dark powers that appear to bend the laws of reality come from? They are from the same source as Crazy Celes'. Both of us are simply what they call, "demon gods"."

As Akame was explaining this, Crazy Celes was standing at the door to the principal's office, described as such on the windowpane. Snickering to herself before she walked in, she shouted to the person who was sitting by the desk with the chair facing the other way…

"YOU WANTED TO FIRE ME, SIR?!"

"ONLY IF YOU REFUSE TO SLEEP WITH ME!" the person in the chair yelled as they turned around to face Celes, revealing that it was a clone of Celes that she had created out of magic. "WE'RE GOING TO DO IT LIKE THEY DID IN THAT 5-HOUR ENERGY COMMERCIAL!"

"IS THAT SEXUAL HARASSMENT?!" the Celes at the door shouted.

"NO!" the Celes in the chair answered. "THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH HAVING SEX WITH YOURSELF, EVEN WHEN YOU DON'T WANT TO! YOU'RE THE ONE DOING THIS TO YOURSELF!"

"HA HA, BUT YOU JUST FUCKED YOURSELF WITH THAT LOGIC!" the Celes at the door bellowed. "BECAUSE NOW I'M THE ONE DOING THIS TO YOU!"

"NNNNNOOOOOO!" the Celes in the chair screamed as the Celes at the door came in and shut the door behind her. "YOU CAN'T! I'LL TELL CORPORATE, MY BIG BOSS, ON YOU!"

"BIG BOSS HAS BEEN FUCKING YOU ALL YOUR LIFE!" Celes proclaimed to her clone. "WHO DO YOU THINK AUTHORIZED THIS?!"

The clone screamed and cried as Celes raped her before absorbing her back into her body, transforming her back into the magical energy she once was.

"Phew!" Celes went, smiling nonchalantly and shamelessly as she kicked back in the chair. "After putting up with the ATTITUDE I was getting in class today, that was a great way to silence the kettle for good! Noimman would be proud!"

"Heh heh heh heh heh…" a familiar voice laughing could be heard. "Proud to see you coming in her office without permission?"

Celes almost jumped out of her skin (before deciding against it) when she saw the face of Noimman peeking through the windowpane and laughing.

"You don't think this will cause some kind of explosion?" she said to Celes, who had her hand on her chest, looking like she was about to have a heart attack.

"AND I DIDN'T EVEN BRING ANY NITROGLYCERINE!" she cried.

Quickly, she turned on the intercom and screamed for help before the door opened and she saw…

"Noimman…" Adrian said to herself as she looked at the poster she had retrieved from the window. "So that's why we were brought here. They want us to kill Noimman…"

Adrian had overheard Celes' cry on the intercom, along with Akame and Felix. Pressing her fingers against the poster tightly in rage, she said to herself…

"We have to get out of here…"

In the other classroom, Felix had a similar feeling after hearing Akame explain to him what this was all about…

"So Noimman is a demon god too…" he said, trembling in fear. "And you want Adrian and I to work with you to kill her. I'm sorry, but I don't think we can do that…"

"I'm sorry too…" Akame replied as she put her hands on Felix's shoulders and brought her closer to him. "But this isn't about what you or anyone else thinks...this is about what _must_ be done…"

"What must be done…" Felix repeated. "That seems to be what it always comes down to. What must be done. We get told to live our lives any way we want to, but it gets proven to us again and again that's not the case. We were our parents' pawns, and now we're going to be your pawns. And if we don't become your pawns, that makes us selfish. As well as wrong to condemn you for being selfish and trying to trap us in an inescapable cycle of emotional manipulation. If that's what you want to do, just try it. You may have our compliance on the outside, but never on the inside. That's because we're too smart to fall for your game. We know you don't care about us or love us."

Akame gave Felix a deadpan stare the entire time he was talking, and now...she was blushing…

"Felix...I do love you…" Akame replied. "If my true intention was to use you and your sister as pawns, I would've done just that. Manipulated your minds to make you my slaves."

After hearing this, Felix gulped, losing his bold stance and beginning to feel guilty.

"Wow…" he said in disbelief as he thought through everything again, all of Akame's mannerisms, and realized that she genuinely did have a crush on him. "I'm really sorry, I just got caught up in my venti-"

Felix was interrupted by Akame kissing him. Akame then brought their bodies together and started making out with him. When she finished, she said in his ear…

"Don't apologize. You're kind, humble, _and_ willing to stand up to me. You couldn't even begin to understand how happy I am to see a child of Satan turn out so well…"

"...Child of Satan?" Felix replied in confusion before the classroom door burst open and Adrian entered with an angry look on her face. Instinctively, Felix and Akame quickly moved away from each other after Adrian glared at them.

"I'd ask what the hell was going on in here…" she remarked bemusedly. "But I've got much bigger fish to fry than petty romance drama…"

"What do you mean?" Felix asked, worried about how much Adrian had seen with him and Akame.

"We're leaving this shithole." Adrian stated bluntly. " _NOW_. We're going back home right away to tell our parents that they can suck it."

"Wait Adrian," replied Felix, "I know what's really going on now too. I know it was wrong for our parents to force us into this. But we can't allow Noimman to keep doing what she's doing."

"And why's that?" Adrian retorted. "We've been allowing her to do what she's done all the time we've known her, accepting that there's nothing we can do about it."

"That's where both of you have been wrong, however." Akame interjected. "There has always been something for you two to do about it, and it's very simple. Become strong enough to stand up to Noimman."

"I never knew strength fell from the sky." Adrian remarked sarcastically. "Shut your lip and go play with your bells if that's the best you can come up with to coax us into your game."

"It's not my game…" Akame said in a chilling voice as she got out her bells. "It's Noimman's game. And if I don't force you to be a part of it, she will. And she'll do it in the most brutal way she can possibly imagine."

"Ha ha ha ha ha…" a familiar laugh was heard from behind Adrian. "That's the best argument you could have made, Akame. Well done."

"Fuck, you!" Adrian exclaimed as she got in a fighting pose when she turned around to see Noimman.

"Please don't tell me you actually believed I didn't consider the possibility that you would try to get your way out of this by running." Noimman teased sinisterly. "You think home is safe? Even if your parents were truly on your side, they'd have no way to resist me."

"Why are you even doing this in the first place?!" Adrian demanded to know. "Are you just toying with us for fun to satisfy your bloodlust? Do you actually believe we can kill you because you just want to die that badly?"

"I hardly have the reason figured out myself…" Noimman replied ominously, creepily smiling as she put her hand to her cheek. "Maybe it's both…"

"Well then, maybe I can help you figure out the reason…" Adrian made a rejoinder to hint that she was about to punch Noimman in the face. However, with the ringing of Akame's bells, her fist was stopped from hitting Noimman...by the ghost of a young man in a white robe and a white hat who had used a book to block Adrian's fist.

"Please, control your anger." the ghost pleaded. "You must not engage Noimman before you have mastered the fusion of Yin and Yang. You must not repeat the same mistake my brother and I made."

Adrian was stunned and puzzled...but felt that this spirit was telling the truth as she pulled her fist back, the ghost vanishing as she did. Looking at the new expression of perplexment on Adrian's face, Noimman giggled.

"I wasn't being honest…" she teased. "I do know _exactly_ why I brought you here. For me, torturing weaklings has become far too boring to keep me even the slightest bit engaged anymore. I brought you here because I want to see you and your brother grow into a worthy pair of adversaries. But it doesn't end there, no. That would also be too boring. Here is the only place where you and your brother will be able to learn the purpose of your creation…"

Noimman then began to walk away before she suddenly turned back around and finished what she was saying with the most sinister grin she had smiled yet, as her glowing red eyes could be seen through her glasses…

"...and I want to be as close to you as possible as I watch you writhe in torment upon discovering the truth…"

After that, she left for real, heading back to the principal's office. Adrian and Felix were left feeling more sickened than they ever had felt.

"I almost regret not decking her…" Adrian said with a growl.

"Why is she so evil?" Felix asked. "What did we ever do to her?"

"Before you can understand why Noimman is the way she is, you must first understand why you are the way you are…" Akame interjected as she rang her bells again, this time causing a pool of darkness to appear below the trio. "There is a lot I need to show you…"

And with that, the trio descended into the darkness, being teleported to an orphanage…

...a strangely familiar orphanage…

Meanwhile, Noimman had entered her office, and was confused when she saw a white card lying on her desk. It was like the one she had given Adrian, only this one read…

 _No. God_

"Hmm?" she said upon noticing it and picking it up. "Was someone in here? Or did I leave this here by accident?"

To test if it was one of her cards or not, Noimman tore it in two, then put the two torn pieces back together. To her surprise, the two pieces did not glue themselves back together with darkness. Rather, what filled in the tear…

...was light.


	14. Chapter 14

Episode 14: Meaning We Know

"Hell's Orphanage…" a male pegasus with white hair, red fur, and a red cape said, bowing to King Nero, who was dressed like King Sombra, only wearing a purple king's robe rather than a red one, in his throne room. "That's where she took us."

The pegasus' name was Dante, and he was surrounded by his comrades, the remaining two Nightbringers, Trish and Vergil, and the Helllights (formerly known as the Jaeger Raid), Gordon, Ricard, and Vincent. Vincent was taking the place of Leo, who was oddly not present…

"That is where my comrades and I get our dark powers from…" Dante explained, as Nero had requested the Nightbringers to tell them where they got their strength from. "Ever since we were children, we have known nothing but grueling torture."

"So that's all?" Nero retorted with a smile, surprising the Nightbringers with his nonchalant attitude, save Dante. "I don't mean any insult, I was just hoping to hear something different than what I was expecting."

"That is an insult…" Vergil interjected. "You're giving no regard to how hurt we were back then."

"Yeah, you're the one who asked us!" Trish exclaimed. "If you don't care about our life story, don't ask for it!"

"Yup, I knew this how you would react if I spoke my mind." an unphased Nero replied. "Why do you think I was expecting to hear what you told me?"

"Because you've been in our shoes." Dante answered. "You've been tortured by Noimman since you were a child."

"That's only half of it." Nero said, surprising all of them. "I wasn't always a demon, or even a pony for that matter. There was a time where I was just a human boy. Raised in a human world alongside three other human boys, Oro, Enma, and Yata. Oro and Enma are now dead. Noimman told me she used their souls for a special project of hers after they got too wild. Yata, on the other hand, is still alive...depending on how you define the term. Like you guys, we were put through agonizing torture so that we would become stronger...but in our case, it was only to make Noimman stronger…"

"How did she use you to make herself stronger?" Vincent asked.

"Yin and Yang…" Nero answered. "Light and darkness. When you combine those two, overwhelming power is created, as you may have caught on from your battle with Akame. Noimman raised Yata to be strong in the light, and me to be strong in the darkness so that she could harness our powers. She absorbed energy from us into herself to make herself that much stronger than any demon god before her. The story of my strength is really only the story of her strength…"

"Awful…" Gordon said sadly. "To be used like that by your own mother…"

"What happened to Yata?" Ricard asked.

"I've never been sure of what exactly happened to him." Nero replied. "The last thing he told me when I saw him was that if I ever met him again, I wouldn't even recognize him. That he would have to sell himself to God in order to surpass Noimman's power. That he would have to become like both God and Noimman…"

Meanwhile, in the world of Adrian Bruce, Akame had finished explaining the atrocities she had committed at Hell's Orphanage, the place where they now were…

"...I don't know what to say." Adrian replied, wearing a morbid expression on her face, just as her brother was. "I really don't know how to tell you without being brutally honest about the fact that if you were anyone else, someone we did not need to get help from, I would never want to see your face again."

"You went as far as to murder and torture innocent children…" Felix bluntly said, feeling aghast. "How could you do that? I wanted to know about why Noimman is the way she is, but now I have to know how you ever ended up that way more than anything. We may have been raised in a dark world ourselves, but there's no way we can associate with you unless we fully know you and have proof that you are no longer evil."

"For starters," answered Akame, "I would never tell anyone this if I was still evil. Noimman and her children are the only other ones in this world who know the full truth about me. Not even Celes, the first demon god, is aware of the details of the horrible things I have done. And for a long time, I knew nothing about Celes. Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord wiped my mind clean of my memories as a human before they put me in the world of the heralds. As far as I know, I did not choose to be a demon god. That's what Rarity and Discord told me. How true that is, I don't know…"

"I'd feel more inclined to trust you…" Adrian said, feeling calmer, but shooting Akame a skeptical look. "...IF you had concrete evidence. How do we know that "Ninja Time God Rarity" and "Fantasy God Discord" aren't just characters that you made up?"

"Yeah…" Felix interjected, also feeling calmer, yet doubtful. "We're not even sure if God is real or not, and now you're telling us about gods of fantasy and... _ninja time_?"

"She tells me it's actually reality," replied Akame, "she just thinks that "Ninja Time" sounds cooler. And even though I can't prove to you that they exist, they can. They telepathically communicate with any character they have created who has realized the purpose of their existence. After all, this world is not actually real. It is merely a setting that they created as a part of their story."

Adrian and Felix looked almost as morbid as they had after Akame told them of her atrocities in the classroom of Hell's Orphanage.

"What. a. crock. of. SHIT." they bluntly answered, staunchly disbelieving what they had just heard. "What are you going to tell us next, that the world was actually created last Thursday?"

"I know, it's completely ridiculous." Akame said, being just as blunt. "But so is everything if you really think about it. The very fact that we exist doesn't make any sense. How did nothing become something? How did zero magically equal one? We can tell ourselves that the universe just always existed, but that doesn't make sense either, because if something exists, it must have been created by something preceding it. Even "real people" struggle to understand reality, so now that I have suggested to you that you are fictional characters, how will you prove to me that you exist?"

Adrian was still as perplexed as ever, but Felix was starting to understand better what Akame was trying to do as she smiled and winked to him.

"Oh, I get it…" Felix finally remarked. "This is a riddle of some sort. If we're to learn about Yin and Yang, we need to open our minds to a new way of thinking."

"Yup." Akame replied. "Just give me your best answer."

"I've personally thought about this many times." Felix began telling Akame his answer to her puzzle as Adrian tried to follow along. "I feel that the best answer I came up for a positive reply to this question was this. We can't prove that we exist because there's nothing to prove. We can't "not exist" because there's no such thing as nonexistence. There's no question of whether there was nothing before the universe came into existence or not because nothingness is only a concept. "Nothing" is only a word meant to explain the absence of something. That's why something can not be created out of nothing, because nothing isn't real. The absence of something has no real manifestation. There isn't anything that could've preceded something, and we don't need anything to precede something to explain the creation of the universe if it precedes, and is not limited, by time. Even the concept of The Void, the infinite abyss of darkness said to exist at the start of the universe in theory, is just that, darkness, which is something."

"...Stuff stuff complicated stuff…" Adrian said in her mind, just becoming more confused. "Something something philosophy…"

"Bingo!" Akame exclaimed happily. "You're on the right track, though you're only scratching the surface. There's much more to it than that. How do we know that the universe needed to be created at all? Creation is just transformation if you really think about it, and as a fellow chemist, you should know that one of the laws of chemistry is that matter can't be created or destroyed."

"That is very interesting, but how does that tie in with Yin and Yang?" Felix asked, as Adrian was relieved to hear him ask a question she could relate to.

"You mentioned earlier the infinite darkness known as The Void." Akame recalled. "Did you know that darkness has light to it that you can see, despite the fact that darkness is supposed to be the absence of light? So even if we're going with the whole Void theory, we can still argue that both darkness and light have always existed, even before the birth of the universe."

"Wow," replied a fascinated Felix, not noticing a frustrated Adrian feeling the exact opposite, "I can't believe I never thought of it that way. If that's true, do you think it's possible that the fusion of Yin and Yang created the universe?"

"WHO THE FUCK CARES?!" Adrian shouted. "What's the point in all this?! Why are you two jabbering on and on, exchanging outlandish hypotheses based solely on observational conjecture and no sort of empirical evidence?!"

Akame and Felix both shot her a look of confusion, surprised by her "science talk".

"W-what?!" Adrian exclaimed, blushing. "That kind of talk is contagious! And worse yet, none of it has to do with making us stronger so that we can defeat Noimman! I thought we were brought down here to be shown "why we are who we are", not for your life story followed by science class!"

"Adrian, this is part of the process!" Akame asserted in frustration. "How can you practice the technique of combining Yin and Yang if you don't understand the concept of it?!"

"My apologies, sensei." Adrian retorted sarcastically. "How could I let my faith in you grow so weak when I have no reason to have faith in you to begin with! You're a demon god! You're a child murderer! I don't care if you're not as bad as Noimman, hard as that is for me to believe! I know you have a hidden agenda, just like my parents did when they sent us here! If you really want me to trust you, why don't you just give me what I need to stop Noimman right now?! Or are you afraid to lose such a valuable tool?!"

"Adrian, don't talk to her that way!" Felix exclaimed, unhappy with his sister's attitude, and feeling the need to say something after what Akame told him in the classroom after he suspected her of using them as pawns. "Think about it! If Akame was just trying to use us, don't you think-"

Felix was surprised to find himself interrupted by the ringing of Akame's bells, as she looked over at him and shook her head. Though puzzled, Felix obeyed her signal to stop talking and relented. Akame then looked over at Adrian.

"I'll grant you your wish." Akame told her solemnly. "Not because I'm offended by anything you said, but because I realize you're a different kind of learner from Felix. You're not the kind to learn through lectures. You're the kind to learn by getting your feet wet. So I'm going to do the closest thing I can do to "just giving you the power"."

Akame held out her bells in front of Adrian before saying…

"Take them. Ring them and ask for Oro and Enma to endow you with new power. They are the spirits that inhabit these bells, and they obey my every order. They can even hear what we're saying right now. All you have to do is allow them into your body and they will oblige."

Adrian held out her right hand for Akame to drop her bells in. Grabbing them as she dropped them, Adrian told Akame…

"Thanks. Consider yourself off my black list, even if only because you're not worth my time. If Felix thinks differently, that's his life. Me on the other hand, I will never respect you or see you as a friend now that I know what you've done. Death was too good for you, along with anything else you may have gotten."

"..." Akame remained silent, maintaining a deadpan expression on her face as Adrian walked away. She didn't want to show it, but her feelings were hurt, especially by the last thing Adrian said.

"Akame, I'm sorry." Felix tried to comfort her as he put his hand on her shoulder, knowing she had to have been upset by what she heard. "Adrian didn't know that you were just testing us by telling us that you murdered and tortured children…"

"No, I was telling the truth." Akame replied, putting her hands on her face, beginning to cry. "I'm a monster...I deserve no sympathy from anyone…"

Felix was stunned, retreating his hand as Akame sank to the floor. She was down on her knees crying as she put her hands underneath her glasses to wipe the tears. Felix watched her crying with a disheartened frown on his face.

"...What am I supposed to say…?" he wondered. "...What can I do…?"

"Felix…" Akame said through the tears. "I've already given you and Adrian what you need. Just forget about me and start figuring out how to mix Yin and Yang by yourselves now."

"What?!" Felix exclaimed. "You have to be kidding me! We can't do this without your help! You're the only one who can tell us more about Noimman! More about ourselves!"

"I thought that too," replied Akame as her tears began to slow, "but I was a fool to think that I could get you and Adrian to understand everything with a lecture. The only reason you were able to follow along with me is because you already have a fundamental idea of how to mix light and darkness together. I can't teach you anything that you can't learn for yourself. Just drink the can I gave you and go from there…"

"...Okay." Felix answered ominously as he grabbed the can from his coat and opened it. "I will…"

He then drank what was inside the can before crumpling it up and tossing it across the floor in homage to Adrian.

"And then I'll go from there…" he said as he crouched down to face Akame and took her by the hands as they both stood up. "...with you…"

Akame responded by giving Felix a hug...and with that, the darkness inside of her heart began to resonate, as well as the light inside of Felix's heart...

Meanwhile, Adrian, now in a white tank top after having removed her blue sweat jacket to prepare for training more rigorously than normal, had gone to the nursery room. She was trying to figure out how the bells she got from Akame worked, for thus far, she was getting no result from following Akame's instructions.

"Oro and Enma…" she said uncomfortably as she rang the bells. "Give me new power...come into my body...ugh! It just sounds so wrong! And it's not even working! Why does there always have to be some dumb little trick to such simple, "Just Add Water" directions?! RRRAAAGGGHHH!"

Adrian gave an angry cry as she threw the bells against the wall in a fit. She had no patience to spare from her mind being burdened by both the reveal of the true intentions of her parents as well as the reveal of Akame's dark past. However, she quickly regretted throwing the bells when she watched them break right before her eyes when they hit the wall, broken shards falling to the floor, and two spirits escaping. Even the wall, despite being part of an otherworldly structure, began to show a crack.

"..." Adrian just looked at the scene, speechless. She didn't know what was more horrifying, the fact that she had just destroyed her only "fast pass" to getting the strength she needed...or her current strength.

"What's going on?" she asked herself. "Ever since I came to this school, I've been getting angrier...and more powerful to the point where I'm scaring myself. I know I need this kind of power to protect people like Felix, but...something about it just feels…"

"Sssssinister?" the voice of a dark spirit from behind interjected.

Adrian turned to face the dark spirit, who was floating next to the white-robed spirit that had stopped her from hitting Noimman. This spirit was a man with black hair and skin like a reptile's.

"Though I haven't met you before," the spirit continued, "I know you've seen my brother, Enma. I'm Oro. Oro, the snake beast of hell, and Enma, the judge of hell."

"So you're Akame's servants…" Adrian said. "What's your story?"

"Ssssstrange…" Oro answered, hissing again. "You were awfully volatile with Akame after she told you her "life story", yet you want to know more about us despite our relationship with her. Interesting. However, know this. As long as your heart continues to hate Akame, you are an enemy of ours. And we will not associate with you before you change your ways, even if it means disobeying our master. Other than that, we will happily lend you our power if you are willing to listen to what we have to say."

Adrian chuckled, putting her hand on her mouth, amused by Oro disagreeing only to reiterate what she just said.

"Sure," retorted Adrian, "even though I already understand now why you click with her. You both love to listen to yourselves talk."

"Tsk tsk…" Enma said as he shook his head and "fanned himself" with his book. "You won't be laughing after we tell you what Akame didn't share with you or Felix. You may think you're hot shit, believing that what you're doing right now is rebelling against her, but in actuality, you're playing right into her hands. As well as Noimman's…"

"How's that?" Adrian asked indignantly.

"Sssssecretly, Akame may be against Noimman, but on the surface, she is her most trusted subordinate." Oro explained. "Noimman knows she can't stop Akame from making you strong enough to defeat her, but she also knows that _you_ can…"

"I get it…" Adrian replied with a heavy sigh. "I have no choice, I have to forgive Akame. So tell me, what's her sob story?"

"Noimman had her tortured and raped...by us." Oro answered, an answer that alarmed Adrian.

"...What?" she asked in shock.

"She told us that we would have to make her suffer for the crimes she committed as a devil god." Enma regretfully explained. "Foolishly, we obeyed Noimman's order, believing it was part of the role we had to fulfill as her children on our quest to surpass her…"

"YOU'RE SHITTING ME!" Adrian yelled. "SHE HAD HER OWN CHILDREN DO THAT?! WHAT, DID SHE MURDER YOU TWO ON TOP OF IT?!"

"Yes." Oro replied. "And it doesn't stop there. Akame used to be an ordinary student at this school, while we attended as students undercover. After Noimman had us commit our atrocity, Akame naturally went to Noimman, the principal, to seek justice. Have you guessed yet how Akame was promoted to vice principal?"

"...I get it." Adrian answered with a very heavy sigh as she knelt her head. "It was all a ploy to make Akame her pawn...while also raping her soul…"

"Exactly." Enma said with a solemn expression, bowing his head as well out of respect. "Noimman promised Akame that we would be imprisoned and reformed, and that she would receive a special gift as a reward for bringing us to justice. But Akame had no idea how Noimman intended to fulfill those promises…"

A flashback then began, showing Noimman strolling through a laboratory filled with test chambers, gazing upon all her latest experiment subjects with an evil smile. With the exception of two, every test chamber she came across either had nothing but dark energy inside of it, or light energy inside of it. The two exceptions were adjacent test chambers, one filled with dark energy and the other filled with light energy, surrounding two clones. The one filled with dark energy was holding a clone of King Sombra and was labeled "No. Uel". The other, filled with light energy, contained a clone of...Noimman, and was labeled "No. God"…

"So my two closest children are the only remaining numbers…" she said. "How boring and predictable…"

Noimman started snickering though when she looked at the clone of her beginning to become consumed by the light energy, until it could no longer be seen.

"So just like God, I can only have one son…"

Noimman then walked to the end of the laboratory, a balcony over what looked like a battle arena. Looking below, she saw Oro and Enma waiting for her, wanting to fight her.

"Because my other two children don't have what it takes to defeat me…" Noimman finished as she leaped off the perch and landed on her feet perfectly to where her children were waiting.

"Ssssso you know, this turn of events does not surprise me." Oro told Noimman. "I've sensed that you've been wanting to get rid of us for quite some time."

"We knew from the start that we couldn't trust you," interjected Enma, "and now, we are finally going to see the fruition of our foresight."

"Wow, I didn't know anyone older than three was capable of seeing that I can't be trusted." Noimman mocked them. "If you want to brag about something, why don't you brag about actually preparing for me to turn on you?"

"As a matter of fact…" Oro said ominously with an evil grin on his face.

"?!" Noimman went, looking down at her legs upon feeling a surging pain in her feet. Two poisonous snakes had bitten her heels from behind, and the venom was spreading up her legs, which were now paralyzed, trapping her.

"It's only a matter of time before that venom reaches your heart and kills you…" Oro explained.

"But no way in hell are we standing around and waiting for that to happen, unlike you..." Enma boasted as he tore two pages out of his book, and poured light energy from his aura into both of them, turning them into sharp, deadly projectiles. He threw them at Noimman's arms, decapitating both of them.

"Sssssooooo, what do you think of us now?" Oro taunted as he watched Noimman look down at her arms and legs with a look of apathy that soon turned into an unpleasant smirk.

"This is the most gruesome death you could imagine for me?" Noimman returned the taunt. "I'm beyond disappointed. You are not fit to be the tools of the greatest demon god. I could've easily intercepted this, but I wanted to at least see if you were worthy of being a lesser devil's playthings…"

"SAVE IT FOR WHEN YOU'RE DEAD!" Oro and Enma both loudly proclaimed as they lunged at Noimman, with Oro prepared to crush Noimman's head and Enma prepared to decimate her heart.

*PHWOO* *WAPOW*

All of a sudden, Noimman countered Oro and Enma by...leaping out of her legs. Two arms of pure, dark energy came out of where her legs used to be and hit Oro and Enma in their jaws with the legs she had abandoned. Stunned from the blows, Oro and Enma wobbled around as Noimman picked up her arms with two arms of dark energy that came out from where her arms of flesh used to be.

"Oh yeah, and don't ever brag to the darkness that you're going to kill it…" Noimman said as she poured dark energy into the arms of flesh to make them deadly blunt objects. "...when your target is only a puppet…"

*WHACK* *POW*

*DING* something gleamed...

"She killed us…" Enma explained as the flashback ended. "And after killing us, she imprisoned our souls in those bells. The next day, she gave the bells to Akame as a "token of friendship", wanting Akame to learn the mortifying origin of them for herself…"

"I've...heard enough." Adrian replied in a surprisingly calm and composed voice. "I know who my enemy is now. Both you guys and Akame have done some truly reprehensible shit...but the fact that a new evil can just come in and make people like you "not so bad" by comparison is what enrages me most of all. So I'll forgive both of you and Akame...in exchange for telling me one more thing…"

Adrian then began to emit a dark aura from her body before she asked Oro and Enma the question that would change everything…

"Who is pulling Noimman's strings?"

As that question was asked, everyone else experienced a sixth sense of what was going on…

"I get it now…" Felix said bluntly. "You planned this all along…"

"My teaching methods are strange, yet effective." Akame replied with a smirk and a wink.

"She's catching on already…" the Dark Sky members thought from inside Noimman. "If she can only free us, taking out Noimman will be a cakewalk…"

"For the first time, I'm actually afraid I might die…" Noimman said to herself with a creepy grin, blushing as she looked at the card again. "Oh God...this is so exciting…such pleasure…"

"Honestly, I wouldn't be _too_ surprised if I ever saw Yata again, ha ha…" King Nero thought to himself.

"HUH?" Crazy Celes reacted to suddenly experiencing a sixth sense of what was happening. "WHEN DID I GET PSYCHIC POWERS?!"

And so, Oro and Enma answered the question with the last thing Adrian would ever have guessed…

"You."


	15. Chapter 15

Episode 15: Ending the No

"NO YES TO THE NO!" Crazy Celes screamed, seemingly at random.

"Of course, I'm open to all possibilities…" King Nero continued saying to himself in thought. "...but I don't believe this premonition I'm getting is a coincidence…"

"I think it's time for us to face Noimman…" Akame told Felix. "...don't you?"

"Most definitely." Felix answered.

"Maybe, from the looks of things, we'll finally be able to bust out of here in style…" the Dark Sky members said to themselves with an escape plan in mind.

"Atop the roof of the school…" Noimman said to herself. "That's where I want to fight them…"

"Never stop pulling the strings…" Adrian told herself. "...never let go until you pull the puppet master out of hiding...and crush that evil force!"

 _Go...never let the evil convince you that you have ceased to be…_

And so, the stage was set for that night...

 _Odd that this is the setting of the final battle, but it makes things more appropriate for an ending with an explosion in the air…_

Ninja Time God Rarity said this as Adrian Bruce and Noimman were staring each other down on top of the school roof, with Adrian wearing a scathing frown, and Noimman wearing her vintage grin of sadism.

 _Don't you agree this is the best place to get a view of the fireworks disappearing into the light, ho ho?_

Adrian clenched her fists tighter than she had ever clenched them, her aura glowing with both dark and light energy as she continued to give Noimman a glare of fury. But Noimman, retaining her composure, simply released her aura of dark and light energy as well, borrowing power not only from the Dark Sky members, but also from all the unspoken victims of her atrocities…

"Try to intimidate me all you want…" an unphased Noimman proclaimed. "Intimidation tactics are worthless against me. I am not afraid of defeat or death, because I am defeat and death…"

"Liar." Adrian retorted in a cold voice. "You are merely being controlled by the avatar of death and defeat, and embrace the power that force has over you. For the first time in my life, I fight knowing I will win not because I am stronger, but because the strength that has been given to me will show my enemy that they don't know their master like I do…"

In response to this, Noimman put her hands to her mouth, unable to contain her excitement any longer.

"HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!" she laughed evilly. "Now THAT is a taunt you make before you battle! All you have to do now is show me the iron in those words! So go on! COME AT ME!"

Adrian then held out her right arm, her right hand still clenched in a fist, before she replied by saying…

"No. Absolutely not. I know what happened with you and your kids. It fucking disgusts me, even just standing here thinking about it. Normally, when someone pisses me off, I settle things with a fight, hand-to-hand combat. Because not only does it help me cool off, it helps me understand the person who pissed me off better. But I'm not just pissed at you...I'm fucking enraged."

"Enough with the fluff." Noimman retorted. "I know what you're up to. You're trying not to repeat Oro and Enma's mistake. But I'm afraid to tell you that the reason they couldn't beat me is not because they recklessly charged at me, it's because they were too weak to begin with. So come on, stop overthinking a strategy and just do your best! All you're doing is delaying me showing you that your best isn't good enough!"

"Do my best?" Adrian responded as her once angry expression began to contort into a confident smile. "I think you're confused. What I was getting at earlier is that I don't give a damn about showing you how strong I am or connecting with you as a fighter. All I want is to show you the combined power of everyone you've hurt…"

*FWOOPA* *SPLURT*

The next thing Noimman knew, Felix was standing behind her, having plunged his hand through Noimman's heart. Like Adrian, he had removed his coat now, dressed in only his white shirt, and had the power of Yin and Yang inside of him, having gained it from his experience with Akame.

"See ya around…" Felix said in a dark voice familiar to none before after the bizarre sound of a vial shattering could be heard.

"YOU SHITSTAIN!" Noimman screamed as she turned around to kick him, but as she did, Felix quickly grabbed Noimman's leg of flesh as he was knocked away, pulling it off.

"FORGETTING SOMETHING?!" Noimman kept shouting, transforming the leg of dark energy that had lost its flesh into a blade of darkness, extending it to try and stab Felix. "DIE!"

*FWOO* *BAM* *SPLURT*

Before Noimman knew what hit her, Adrian came up to her from behind and put her hands together like a hammer to bludgeon Noimman's head of flesh into a bloody pulp. Adrian snickered as she watched the broken glass from Noimman's glasses sink into the remains of her head.

"Ah, I love it when the extra part of the job gets done for me…" Adrian said to herself triumphantly. As Noimman fell to the ground, she walked over to Felix, both of them with smiles on their faces as Felix picked himself off the floor. This had been their plan from the start…

The two had a flashback to when they were still in Hell's Orphanage with Akame. Akame was discussing a plan with them on how they could effectively shut Noimman down.

"When I brought you two down here, I had every intent on teaching you the two most crucial things you needed to know in order to defeat Noimman." Akame explained. "How to fuse Yin and Yang and what Noimman is about. Though Adrian's scathing comments did cause me genuine pain, I always knew the best way to get her to comply was by using reverse psychology…"

"Yeah, yeah…" Adrian retorted. "You know I can't stand it when people beat around the bush. Just get to telling us how we should go about facing Noimman in a fight."

"The first piece of advice I'll give, which I hope will be obvious, is to not fight fair." Akame said bluntly. "We're not the heroes of Dragon Ball Z, having concern for our battle pride. We know we're not stronger than an enemy who doesn't fight fair. In war, battles are not a game of "who's stronger". The winner of the battle is the one who has the best knowledge of how to utilize the strengths of the weak and combine them to create an insurmountable power."

"So just like we needed to learn how to combine Yin and Yang," replied Felix, "Adrian and I also need to learn what our strengths are and how to combine those to form a battle strategy."

"Precisely, as always." Akame concurred. "That was the second thing I planned to cover. Both of you need to work together while doing what you're best at. Adrian's strength is just that, strength, unimaginable raw power. Her brawns can easily destroy any brain. Felix's strength is his mind, a brain that has a frighteningly deep understanding of his heart, as well as the weaknesses of the heart…"

"Going back to us not fighting fair…" Adrian said, musing. "Would you suggest I try some kind of a sneak attack while Felix acts as a distraction?"

"Funny, I was thinking the reverse." Felix interjected. "She knows you're the fighter of the two of us. If I show up acting as "the bait", she'll see through the trap like glass. On the other hand, she won't expect a physical attack from me. After seeing your quick temper back when you nearly punched her, she'll probably expect you to charge at her as soon as possible, thus her guard will be up at all times."

"Noimman won't be able to predict Felix taking her back if she's too busy getting a battle rush over the thought of fighting Adrian." Akame elaborated. "An easy way to do that, even with Felix's lack of battle experience, is with an old technique of Myra Michaels, shadow traveling. It's when you make yourself one with the light and darkness in someone's shadow to teleport behind them and strike from behind as you emerge. Felix should then use that opportunity to not only damage Noimman's heart in that moment, but also plant something inside that will damage her heart permanently. Adrian should do the same to Noimman's brain. Noimman can regenerate even the vital parts of her flesh that have been wounded, but she can not completely cure damage done to her by poisons and other internal hazards."

"We get now how to take care of her flesh…" Adrian replied. "But what about the darkness inside of her?"

"Dealing with that is something you should already know from Oro and Enma." Akame told her with a wink. "Don't forget, God is Satan, Satan is God…"

"..." Adrian went as the flashback ended, and she still found herself confused as she and Felix examined Noimman's remains. This couldn't possibly be over just yet. There was still something left to solve...a riddle…

"Now's our chance!" the Dark Sky members exclaimed. "Before she regenerates anything, let's get out there and give Adrian that message!"

With that, three bright lights came out of Noimman's leg that was no longer inside its flesh, and materialized into Hoops, Score, and Derpy Hooves. From out of Noimman's bludgeoned head came Ghost Rainbow Dash.

"Cuz I'm cutthroat…" G.R.D. gave a boastful tease as she pointed out the glass in the gory remains of where she had come from.

Just then, however, Dumb-bell burst out of Noimman's chest. Holding Noimman's heart in his hooves with a look of rage on his face, he gave the other Dark Sky members a jump.

"And I'm bringing on the heartbreak…" he said menacingly as he destroyed the heart with a ball of light energy. Forming it in the hoof he held the heart in, he transformed the light ball into a miniature cyclone that tore the heart to shreds from the inside. Blood went all over him, but he didn't care. He walked over to the remains of Noimman's head and dumped the remains of the heart on it.

"Try putting that back together, cunt." he derided her as one last way of revenge. He then looked around to see the disturbed looks of his companions.

"What?" he asked them. "I'm still pissed off at her for tearing off my fucking dick!"

"That's not the issue." G.R.D. bluntly told him, pointing to Adrian and Felix, who appeared flabbergasted. "We have company, remember?"

"Oh yeah…" Dumb-bell responded in embarrassment, regretting that he had gotten so caught up in his anger that he had forgotten what the next order of business was. Turning to Adrian and Felix, he tried to quickly think of the best way to introduce the gang to them.

"Um, greetings...comrades!" Dumb-bell exclaimed, nervously grinning in a futile attempt to hide the fact that he was winging this. "We're the most trusted subordinates of Fluttershy, the Dark Sky members, and we have come to bring you a message from our lord about Noimman!"

"...You're talking horses." Adrian replied bluntly after a long pause. "...Or talking ponies, whatever."

"And who's Fluttershy?" Felix asked. "Is she related to Ninja Time God Rarity or Fantasy God Discord by any chance?"

"Hey, I'm the ghost of a talking horse or a pony, whatever!" G.R.D. exclaimed, responding to Adrian, unamused at not being recognized.

"..." Score silently answered Felix's question with the description of Fluttershy on her MLP Wiki page, along with strange tidbits from Naruto, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Final Fantasy, and a description of Eris, the goddess of chaos in Greek mythology. And even though this garnered him a confused stare from everyone else, he did not feel embarrassed. After all, this was the best information the human world had on these subjects.

"Uh…" Dumb-bell responded, unsure what to say exactly. "I...think we're getting off the topic at hand here. We can fill you in on all that shit later. Or at least a bit of that shit. Our first priority is giving you the message Fluttershy sent us to deliver…"

After saying that, the Dark Sky members recited the poem Fluttershy had shared with them before they came to Adrian Bruce's world. Upon listening to the message, Adrian and Felix immediately got to thinking…

"So that's her full name…" Adrian said to herself in her mind. "Noimman Uel...come to think of it, I remember the card Noimman gave me saying, "No God is with us". Could it be that she wasn't just giving me the password back then...but also her name card?"

Curious, Adrian pulled the card out of her pocket, and putting a drop of Noimman's blood that got on her thumb next to "No", she started getting an idea...

"The poem seems to be talking about Akame's death and defeat in the world of the heralds sparking the birth of Noimman…" Felix thought to himself. "It talks about Satan in the beginning and God at the end. But it mentions God irreverently, so it doesn't appear to be viewing God as good. And if the evil is returning in reverse…"

*DING* something gleamed…

...and what gleamed caught Adrian and Felix's eyes. Strings. Light was being shone upon a set of strings that were attached to Noimman's body from behind. Adrian gasped as she had a flashback to what she had talked to Oro and Enma about…

"What did you say?" she asked, confused about how they had answered her question about who was pulling Noimman's strings. "How am I the one pulling Noimman's strings? When the hell did I become the bad guy in all this?!"

"It has nothing to do with you being the bad guy, as you're describing it." Oro replied. "What it has to do with is how your actions have an effect on what Noimman does…"

"Wait...are you suggesting that I'm helping Noimman without even realizing it?" Adrian inquired.

"Not just that," answered Enma, "but it's also possible that you're hurting Noimman without even realizing it…"

"But how?" Adrian replied.

"To understand that, we must reveal one more truth to you." the two spoke together ominously. "With this final revelation, you shall comprehend all you must know in this world…"

"Then tell me." Adrian responded in a brazen tone. "Whatever truth it is I need to know, I swear that I will have the strength to bear it, no matter how difficult it may be to accept. I'd much rather live knowing the ugly truth than live being deceived by a "beautiful" lie..."

"Very well then, we shall tell you." the two told her solemnly.

And so, the ugly truth they shared with Adrian was this…

"The very reason for you and your brother's existence...is Noimman herself."

Adrian couldn't contain her shock, shown by the mortified expression on her face as she felt a chill run down her spine and a tremor shake her heart. What followed were the words she didn't want to say, but knew there was no way to avoid saying them…

"What does that mean…?"

"It means that the very reason you and your brother were born was to kill Noimman." they answered, melancholy filling their tone of voice. "Noimman is the daughter of God, brought into this world as part of God's plan for the spiriting. And you and your brother are the children of Satan, brought into this world to stymie God…"

And just as Twilight Sparkle had done before her, Adrian reacted to the revelation of her true identity with a loud, long, bellow of…

"NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

… _.._

 _God is Satan, and Satan is God._

 _Light is darkness, and darkness is light._

It was only after understanding these concepts that Adrian was finally able to truly understand how to combine Yin and Yang. And it was only through learning the painful truth that she was able to understand these concepts and share them with her brother, who also accepted them. She and her brother were darkness that could not exist without the light. But in turn, light could not exist without them. There was no such thing as a world where their existence couldn't be justified, for without them, Noimman's creation could not be justified.

However, that leaves the question of why Noimman was created. Why would God allow such an evil force to come into the world? And as Adrian saw the light make Noimman's strings visible, she leaped towards them in a heartbeat, and pulling them with all her might, she hoped to finally see the answer to that question…

"SHOW YOURSELF NOIMMAN!" Adrian bellowed. "SHOW US WHAT YOUR REASON FOR BEING HERE IS!"

"...That's all you want to know?" Noimman replied. "I'm disappointed. I thought you would have figured it out by now. My reason for doing what I do is nothing complicated. I just want to do what God sent me here to do while being myself…"

Adrian, Felix, and the Dark Sky members found that easy to believe as they saw Noimman's true form. A mass of pure darkness...that took the form of…

Noava Falling, Twilight Sparkle's demon daughter from the Awakening project.

Adrian and Felix didn't know what to say, not recognizing her, but the Dark Sky members glared at her sternly, remembering her…

"We should've known…" they said angrily. "Just when we thought we were finally out of Boss' clutches for good, all of a sudden, we have to babysit her kid…"

"Oh please," retorted Noava, "don't act like you had it the worst in the Awakening project. First, I find out that Twilight skipped over my brother and I's childhoods. Then I find out that Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord just wrote my brother and I in the story as extras. You don't know how glad I was to be reborn in the Spiriting world as Noimman. Now, I get to serve a god who actually cares about me and my brother and I get to take my revenge on those clowns on top of it!"

"SO THAT'S WHY YOU DID WHAT YOU DID?!" Adrian and Felix screamed, enraged. "WHO IS THIS SO-CALLED GOD OF YOURS?!"

"The star." Noava replied with a smug grin. "The true ruler of the universe. He ensured my creation before he fused with Satan and God. He worked through Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy, using Twilight's hatred and Fluttershy's lust for battle to ensure that I was transformed into Noimman through the light and dark energy of Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, similar to how I was conceived in the Awakening project. But unlike that catastrophe, I was actually given a crucial role to play in this project. I was able to make you two children of the dark stronger in the light, thus preparing you for the spiriting."

"The spiriting?" they asked. "What's that supposed to be?"

"It's when we send mortal souls who have grown strong enough on mortal worlds such as this…" she continued explaining. "...into the bodies of gods, where they shall inhabit the Immortal World. Have you ever wondered why this world was so underpopulated?"

Adrian and Felix then thought through how everything had progressed and started to realize what she meant…

"So that's what the school that brought together all our areas of regular, unavoidable monotony was supposed to represent…" they said. "It was part of the test. It distracted us from our "true purpose" of killing you. Then when we found out there was no way to avoid killing you, new diversions came our way. Our hatred of you, our sorrow from seeing how others had suffered because of you, and simply not understanding what everything was all about...until we discovered how to mix light and darkness together…"

"Yes, and now that you have passed the test by killing my body and proving your strength, I have a deal to offer you two." Noava proposed. "Since you're going to have to give up your mortal lives for godly lives no matter what, why don't you two join me and we'll just end the fighting here?"

"Join you?!" they yelled. "Once this fight is over, we don't want anything more to do with you!"

"Ha ha, but just wishing for that isn't enough…" Noava teased. "I'm the daughter of the ruler of the universe, and you two are on your way towards achieving godhood. Our paths will inevitably cross. And if you have that much of a problem with me…"

Noava's grin grew much more creepy and sinister as she pulled a string above her head that was made visible through the light and dark energy she pumped into it from her aura. Dark clouds in the sky above rolled back to reveal a light that shone upon Noava from the heavens…

"You're going to have to take it up with my father in heaven…" she proclaimed boldly. "...who also happens to be _your_ father in heaven. You may be the devil's children, but it matters not. GOD IS SATAN AND SATAN IS GOD! AND GOD IS WITH US! MWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!"

"..." Adrian and Felix remained silent, feeling that they truly were stuck this time. What were they to do?

"Ha ha ha ha ha," continued Noava with her evil laugh, "I'll take your silence as a...maybe to my offer. Don't worry, I'll give you some time to come to a definite answer…"

As she said that, Adrian and Felix jumped back as they noticed what she trying to divert them from...Noimman's corpse was regenerating. While they were talking, her head and heart were being repaired. Noimman's heart was put back where it was, reattaching itself to what held it. Her head was fully restored, all of the flesh and tissue that had been destroyed now as good as new after she had picked out the glass. Noava took the rein on Noimman's strings again, and Noimman's body stood up, completely rejuvenated...but Adrian, Felix, and Dumb-bell merely smirked.

"Is that all you got?" they taunted, having prepared for this.

Noava caught on to the fact that something was wrong when she saw small spurts of blood erupting from Noimman's body, and her skin turning blood red as her body began to decompose.

"What's going on?!" Noava exclaimed.

"My poison seems to be taking effect…" Felix remarked, happy with the fruit of his labor. "That vial I crushed inside of Noimman's heart contained a deadly bio-weapon that I recently created. And mixed with the power of Yin and Yang, its destructive effects should be more potent than ever…"

"But, but that guy destroyed Noimman's heart when he broke out of her body!" Noava yelled, confused. "All the liquid inside should have splattered along with the blood! How did whatever you had in that vial have time to spread all throughout her heart?"

"Well, you see…" Felix replied, prepared to explain how his bio-weapon worked, until he realized that he himself didn't know how the bio-weapon was able to react with all of Noimman's heart cells after Noimman's heart was destroyed by Dumb-bell. "...um...it's kind of hard to explain if you don't understand…"

"I'LL explain it." Dumb-bell interjected, eager to rub this in her face. "I knew that whoever got Noimman in the heart wouldn't pass up the opportunity to put some kind of poison in it, and that I'd look like a real jackass if I ended up accidentally helping you. So I used the miniature cyclone of light energy to contain whatever poison was inside, as well as spread the poison all around! My taunt was merely to goad you into getting cocky, thinking I wouldn't know."

"Wow Dumb-bell," said Ghost Rainbow Dash, genuinely impressed by his strategy, "you really thought that out. You broke her heart, then tricked her into killing herself. Your sadism is to be admired."

"What can I say?" Dumb-bell replied. "I was just really mad at her for destroying my fucking cock!"

Noava began to worry. She tried repairing Noimman's body by regenerating the exploding cells and repairing the corroding flesh, but it was no use. She was only repairing damage that was just going to redo itself, she realized as she saw Noimman's body decay more and more. Hunks of rotting flesh were popping off her body, then falling to the ground to melt and explode in a mess of blood and decomposed tissue. Noava was forced to accept that her body was down for the count...but she soon got a smug smile of her own as an idea hit her…

"Of course, what was I thinking?" she remarked sinisterly as she let go of Noimman's strings, letting her rotting body fall to the ground. "Why am I bothering with making a meat puppet dance…"

Adrian, Felix, and the Dark Sky members put their guard up as they saw Noava beginning to form a ball of light containing a miniature cyclone of her own in her hands.

"WHEN MY OWN POWER IS ENOUGH TO BLOW THE STAGE SKY-HIGH?!" she finished as everyone else saw how large the ball of light was growing and sensed how destructive its power would be. Immediately, Dumb-bell grabbed Adrian and Hoops grabbed Felix, trying to fly away from the rooftop along with the other three Dark Sky members.

"YOU THINK YOU CAN JUST RUN?!" Noava taunted them as they tried to flee. "My target isn't you…"

Noava then revealed what she intended to do with the attack as she planted the ball of light inside of Noimman's body, which started melting faster and having more volatile explosions throughout it than before as it began to expand. Now with her hands free, she zapped Dumb-bell and Hoops' wings with light lasers from her fingertips. Dumb-bell and Hoops yelled in agony as they each felt their left wing be ruptured, a giant hole in each wing being created. Unable to keep flying properly, they began to lose altitude and their trajectory shifted back to the direction of the school rooftop.

"My target from the start was my own body!" she exclaimed maniacally. "I intend for _all of us_ to be caught in the explosion! If I die here, Daddy can always work something else out for me. But if you die here, you'll go with me and be forced to acquiesce whatever we decide!"

Adrian and Felix began to fret, worrying that this might actually be the end...until for the first time, they heard the voice of Ninja Time God Rarity.

 _What are you two so worried about? You're still the ones pulling the strings here…_

Suddenly, Adrian and Felix remembered the string Noava had pulled earlier to unveil the light…

"Unlike Akame, I will actually accomplish something with my death!" Noava declared, boasting. "I truly am not subject to gods who only see me as a dispensable tool! I am Noimman, the greatest devil god! LIGHTNING CAME DOWN FROM HEAVEN AND NOIMMAN ROSE!"

 _Ho ho, if God is Satan, and Satan fell from heaven...well..._

Adrian and Felix gasped as they saw multiple strings attached to Noava, coming down from the light. They knew what they had to do now…

"WE CAN'T HOLD ON ANYMORE!" Dumb-bell and Hoops cried, unable to fly properly or hold Adrian and Felix from the pain. "SCORE! DERPY! CATCH THEM!"

Score and Derpy flew under Dumb-bell and Hoops, holding their hooves out to catch Adrian and Felix as they fell...but Adrian and Felix simply used their hooves as platforms to leap towards something…

"Oops, I missed." Derpy lamented in her usual misunderstanding of the situation.

"..." Score silently showed his appreciation for Adrian and Felix's courage despite the situation...as he and the other Dark Sky members saw that Adrian and Felix had taken hold of the strings from the heavens that held Noava, and had climbed up them as if they were ropes. They were close to the light high above her, and both of them had an aura of light and dark energy glowing all around them as they began pulling the strings with all their might…

"OH NO, YOU DON'T!" Noava exclaimed as she shot lasers from her hands at Adrian and Felix from below at full power. However, G.R.D. covered Adrian and Felix, holding out her hooves that were dripping with ectoplasm to block the lasers.

"GGGRRRAAAGGGHHH!" she cried in pain as she absorbed the laser energy into her hooves. "NO WAY AM I LETTING THIS END WITHOUT SHOWING DUMB-BELL I CAN DIRTY THESE HOOVES FOR A GOOD CAUSE! DO IT NOW, GUYS!"

"MWA HA HA HA HA HA!" Noava laughed evilly. "AS IF THEY HAVE THE STRENGTH TO PULL DADDY DOWN! NO ONE'S STRONGER THAN US! AND ONCE THEY'RE DEFEATED, NO ONE WILL EVER EVEN COME CLOSE TO OUR POWER AGAIN! HA HA HA HA HA! HA ha ha ha...ha…"

Noava's laugh grew slower as she felt the light of her father shine on her from above. Looking above in surprise, she was baffled by the sight of Adrian and Felix smiling at her triumphantly, surrounded by the spirits of Oro, Enma, and Akame. They had succeeded in pulling the puppet master out of the light, who was revealed to be…

...Yata.

"W-what…" Noava said, stuttering in disbelief. "W-who are you? Where's God?! Where's Dad?!"

"Your dad merged with the other two of the Eternal Three…" Yata explained with a menacing grin on his face. "...so he handed your reins over to me...the next in line to be God...No. God, to be exact…"

Noava gasped before she said…

"No, it can't be you…"

"Long time, no see, Noava…" Yata replied as he took the syringes out of his head, which caused his hair to grow long and his face to contort into the image of…

...Noimman.

"The experiment from long ago, where I sought to create a light clone of myself and merge with it to become equal to God…" Noava remarked. "...it wasn't a failure after all."

"Yes…" Yata answered ominously. "Nero was not the only child of yours worthy of being your heir...for I have not only surpassed you, but I am now also God. And now, you shall be assimilated by my light of judgment as punishment for all the evil you have done…"

At that moment, Noimman's body finally exploded, and Noava was caught in it. However, before the explosion could reach Adrian and Felix, Yata blasted light from his hands down below to absorb the explosion, converting it into light energy. The light he beamed was harmless, and didn't hurt Adrian and Felix as it covered them. Yata then began to suck all of the light energy up into his hands along with the strings, as Adrian and Felix leaped off the strings and landed on the rooftop on their feet, unwounded from the power of Yin and Yang. With Noava finally defeated, the Dark Sky members came down to the rooftop to congratulate Adrian and Felix, a job well done. All the darkness in the sky made way for the light of a new day...

"It just goes to show…" Adrian said as they looked out over the rooftop. "Just because someone is pulling the strings...doesn't mean they control the show…"

"Oro, Enma, Akame, Yata, and even you guys…" Felix told the Dark Sky members. "We could never have done this without your help. Just like Yin and Yang came together to give us power that made us formidable, you came together to give us power that made us invincible."

"I owe Fluttershy a huge apology…" Dumb-bell replied, blushing. "I'm now more grateful for her plan than ever."

"Yeah," chimed in Hoops, "we have her to thank for allowing us to meet such great kids like you!"

"..." Score silently shared in the sentiments of this happy ending.

"I can't even get mad at you referring to us as "even you guys"..." Ghost Rainbow Dash commented, also sharing in the sentiment. "I'm glad I did what I did for you…"

"And I'm glad my mistake helped save the day!" Derpy exclaimed obliviously, as everyone shared a laugh.

 _Adrian and Felix were no longer concerned with how they were created. Their parents may have made a pact with Satan, as well as a pact with God...but what mattered most is that the red pill their mother coughed up...was a key that opened the gateway to this fantastic reality..._

"AND THEN EVERYONE LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER OR DID THEY, THE END!" Crazy Celes yelled as she poked her head out from the sky where Yata was. "IT'S NOT OVER YET! THINK ABOUT ALL THE LOOSE ENDS THAT NEED TO BE TIED! LIKE HOW I GOT HERE!"

"Well, there's a simple explanation to that." the kid who had his eyes gouged out by Celes and replaced with robot ones by Akame interjected, abruptly appearing where Yata was as well. "The Noimman who approached you at the principal's office was actually Yata. In exchange for staying out of the way, he promised you protection from Noimman here."

"Oh yeah!" Celes exclaimed. "But wait, how did _you_ get here then?!"

"I'm Noava's brother, Arc Rising." the kid introduced himself. "I was sent here to record all the fighting under Yata's orders."

Arc then touched his right robot eye, revealing it had a camera function as a stop button appeared in it. He then touched it again, causing a disc to emerge from his mouth, which he subsequently grabbed and gave to Yata.

"Good work, Arc…" Yata complimented his subject. "King Nero will be quite pleased, ha ha ha ha ha…"

The End of Adrian Bruce's Story.

Next is the story of King Nero.


	16. Chapter 16

Episode 16: The Dark King

 _Now then, I think that it's time I told you the story of how I became who I am today from the beginning…_

Everything started after Noimman had finished her latest experiment on me, transforming me into her successor, No. Uel, and taking in my power, she saw that there was no more need for me to linger in the human world. She wanted to not only have influence in Adrian Bruce's world, but also in this world, the world of the heralds. Thus, she sent me here to be born as the child of Terra, Captain Leo of the Jaeger Raid's wife, and the destined earth mother of the children of the Trinity. And so, I came into this world as Nero, the son of Noimman, alongside my sister, Spira, the daughter of Fluttershy.

"Ready, set, go!" Terra exclaimed, sending a toy racecar forward on the floor. She was playing with her kids, encouraging Nero to have fun with his racecars while Spira was building a toy castle out of Legos. Yes, my childhood wasn't all bad. Terra was really nice to both of us and always knew how to make us smile. However…

Once I got older, after I started to understand better why she spent so much time with us, everything changed. Not only was it part of her duty to bring us up right, she wanted a substitute for Leo. It was all just part of her obligation to fulfill our needs as a mother, as well as fulfill her own emotional needs…

"Stop it." Spira told Nero, who was wearing a menacing scowl on his face. "That's absurd. Not everything beautiful in this world has a cynical explanation. Our mother loves us, that's all there is to it. There's no way to cynically explain true love."

"Hmm?" Terra went as she overheard her kids having an argument in the same room they had played in when they were young.

"Please…" Nero replied sarcastically, shooting his sister an intimidating glare, his body glowing with dark energy and his eyes emitting a purple haze reminiscent of King Sombra. "I'm not trying to "cynically explain" true love. I'm just telling you the truth that it isn't real."

"...No…" Terra said to herself in fear. "It's begun…and both of them still have no idea!"

"I can't believe what you're saying to me…" Spira said, trembling in terror in response to her brother's words, as well as the dark aura she felt coming from him. "Who told you this slander? I refuse to buy that you've always believed something so unscrupulous!"

"Really?" Nero retorted. "You can't accept the fact that your brother has always been a monster? You lap up everything they say at church, yet you deny the existence of demons? And that we are just as evil as they are? If what they say is true, how can you still believe that I have a soul?"

…..

"Appear before us and show us the way…" Spira responded with a prayer as she closed her eyes.

 _Nero...Spira...this is where their tale begins…through remembrance of prayer and song…_

 _The Eternal King_

 _Heed the call of who catches the stars_

 _Cease every conflict and every farce_

 _Be deaf to the devil's call to sin_

 _Renounce the evil that rests within_

 _Revive that weary, restless soul_

 _Come to the father who makes us whole_

 _Before our loving, eternal king_

 _Hell's tolling bell will never ring_

Terra, Spira, and even Nero were smiling as the worship song concluded.

"I always feel good after I hear a hymn like that." Nero thought to himself. "Easily the highlight of the service. But if even I'm happy…"

Nero looked around at the ponies who were sitting in the benches adjacent to them. He noticed the dull, lifeless expressions on their faces. These were the bored looks of ponies who bore a striking resemblance to…

...Maud Pie.

Nero always wondered why his family never seemed to care that so much of the congregation was made up of clones of Maud Pie. However...

"Let us go to our father in prayer!" the song leader, revealed to be Pinkie Pie, dressed in the white robe of a priest, exclaimed happily.

Despite this being the case for many of the members in the church, the leaders of the church were made up of clones of Pinkie Pie. Unlike the Maud clones, they always had a look of joy on their faces every time they went up to the stage to say something at the podium. However, this was even more confusing to Nero than the lack of enthusiasm from the members. If the leaders were genuinely happy to come to church, why wasn't their cheerful attitude rubbing off on the members? As the members in the church were led to pray, Nero kept his eyes open and looked around to see how many ponies obeyed the call. He saw that most of them knelt their heads and closed their eyes, but a few of them kept their heads up and looked over at him.

"Glad I'm not the only one." Nero said to himself in thought. "Then again, I can't tell if they're thinking what I'm thinking, or if they're just serious busybodies…"

"Hey, put your head down, kid!" a Pinkie Pie clone in the back commanded. "Have some respect!"

"Rrrggghhh…" Nero grunted, still thinking to himself as he knelt his head and shut his eyes in begrudging compliance. "I think I got my answer…"

 _Ha ha ha...so you think you're finally starting to see the true nature of the house of God? You've seen nothing yet…_

"Huh?" Nero said to himself out loud, thinking it was someone in the church. "Who said that?"

"No talking either!" the same Pinkie Pie clone ordered. "What's wrong with kids today? No manners whatsoever!"

"WOULD YOU MIND YOUR OWN GODDAMN BUSINESS?!" Nero yelled in thought, clutching his forelegs in anger. Sensing that something wasn't right, Spira opened her eyes and looked over at Nero.

"Nero, what's wrong?" she asked in concern, looking at her brother's hate-filled eyes just before a new turn of dark events unfolded…

"ULP...BLEAAGGHH!" the Pinkie Pie clone who had called Nero out earlier suddenly threw up a pile of black goop on the floor, which caught the attention of the rest of the church, including the prayer leader.

"Gracious lord." the Maud Pie clones reacted in the most concerned way possible for them as some of them came over to aid the sick Pinkie clone. "What has happened."

Terra and Spira gazed at the scene from behind in fright before they turned back to Nero, whose frustration had turned to worry as he turned his head the other way and shut his eyes with a nervous look on his face.

 _You already know the truth by instinct. But instinctive knowledge isn't always confirmed right away by the dissenting opinions of those around us. And this is where the mind games shall begin…_

The prayer leader had her right foreleg held to her mouth to hide the ugly sneer she had on her face as she watched Nero's expression of guilt.

"The time has come to begin his test…" the prayer leader thought as she went away to convene with the other leaders in the back room. "...for the demonic power we sealed within him is finally starting to manifest…"

Soon, another Pinkie Pie clone, the minister who was giving the sermon, came up to the stage and set some papers on the podium.

"Good morning, church!" she proclaimed in an unsettlingly happy tone of voice.

"Good morning." the church responded in the apathetic monotone of Maud Pie.

"Now I know a lot of you might be confused with the recent turn of events," the preacher commented as she gestured to the sudden illness of the Pinkie clone, "but I assure you that it is only a sign that the Lord is with us today. Whether in sickness or in pain, or even in death, we must never forget the Lord's ever-enduring influence in our lives."

"Amen." the church responded in the same monotone as before.

Terra and Spira smiled at the preacher's attempt to remain optimistic in the face of an ill omen, while Nero frowned, his mind already beginning to find cracks in the preacher's mentality.

"How in the hell is a guy puking ooze from hell a sign from the Lord?!" he questioned the faulty logic in his mind.

 _You say that like these people who claim to be speakers of the Lord's word don't project ooze from hell on a regular basis._

"..." Nero didn't make the same mistake of saying anything out loud in response to the voice that was saying this in his head...but instead began to pay more attention to what this preacher was saying.

"When we see signs like this," the preacher continued, "our instincts like to tell us that they're the work of "evil spirits" or "demons" sent here by the devil in an attempt to fill us with doubt. But I will tell you that the truth of the matter is that God has more power than the devil, and will never allow him to directly harm us in such a way. When such things happen, we must remember that they are only a test of our faith."

"...That makes no sense." Nero said to himself in thought, growing not only frustrated, but concerned for this blatant disregard for reason being used as a platform to promote blind faith. "If the devil didn't cause that guy to vomit supernatural ooze and the devil's minions didn't either, then what did cause it?!"

 _She knows it was you, but she'd never tell the congregation that. Not out of altruism, but out of unwillingness to own up to allowing a child with demonic power such as yourself to harm someone in the church. After all, that wouldn't just be their mistake...that would also be God's mistake…_

"So they're deliberately lying to cover things up…" Nero replied to the voice, growing angrier as his eyes began to glow red.

 _Hey, calm down. We're not even at the main event yet. The next thing that you'll hear will blow more than just your mind…_

"When we see these signs," declared the preacher, "we like to worry for our souls in our lack of faith. But I will tell you church, that not only is this worrying not right in the sight of God completely irrational from a faith-driven perspective, but it is also completely irrational from a logical perspective. Our "souls" are not what we think they are. The immortality of the soul is not a teaching of the Lord, but rather a pagan teaching passed down through mythology. If our faith is in the eternal life of our "souls", then our faith is in the wrong place. Where our faith should be is in our heavenly father, who will come to wake up our "souls" after death. And only through that faith, church, is our resurrection possible."

"...Are you fucking kidding me?" Nero responded in his mind, unable to comprehend how this preacher had come around to saying something like this. "So we're just meatbags...being left to rot...before God comes to "wake us up". Wake _what_ up? Our decomposed brains?! This is why we come here every week?! To just be reminded that we're a weak body and mind that's just waiting to be reborn as that pitiful creature again?! THAT'S ALL THERE IS TO SALVATION?! Who in their right mind would buy into this garbage?!"

Most everyone in the church apparently, as many of the members applauded the preacher by clapping their hooves together. Nero was mortified...especially when he saw that these members included Terra and Spira.

 _Take a good, long look, kid. This is what organized religion is really about. They don't want rationality and reasoning, even within their own realm of logic. They don't want the truth. They just want to preach something simple and convenient for the masses who aren't in their right mind…_

"...Okay." Nero despondently replied in his mind, heartbroken. "...Whatever works for them. But what about me? What do I believe in now? On what grounds do I believe that "me" is even real? How will I ever again believe...in my soul?"

Terra and Spira then looked over at Nero and immediately knew something wasn't right. Their smiles quickly turned to looks of concern as they saw the anger...and the sorrow that was conveyed by the expression on his face. The preacher noticed this too, and even more…she gave an evil smirk as she saw who was saying those words in Nero's mind...she saw the ghost of a familiar foe hovering over Nero, giving him a malignant stare. She had eyes just like his…

...only his could only contain so much of the evil, allowing the rest to escape and manifest into a purple haze…

Looking into those eyes was like looking into a spiral that continued forever and ever in an endless descent towards the infinite darkness. The darkness that was free from time, separating not the past from the present and future as we do, and taking us back to where Spira and Nero stood now. After Spira had finished praying, she continued to keep her eyes shut, not wanting to be caught within that spiral…

"Nero, you have the right to be upset." Spira sympathized, attempting to put aside as much of her own emotion as she possibly could. "God's men can make mistakes and choose careless words. I know you're not just overreacting to one sermon you heard that you didn't like. I know these feelings must have been building up inside of you over the course of many things. But no matter what's going on with you, you can't allow the darkness inside of you to distrust God and the love he has given to us."

"Show it to me." Nero retorted.

"Huh?" Spira reacted by opening her eyes when she felt the dark energy receding, and saw the purple haze fade from Nero's eyes momentarily.

"Show me God's love." Nero gave her his challenge. "Words mean nothing to me. The only thing that will make me trust in God ever again is if he can take the love he's supposedly given me and show it to me. I want him to actually reach inside of me, take my soul, and show me the love right there in his hand."

Spira instantly caught on to her brother's scheme. Anyone's first instinctive reply would be, "That's impossible.". But with Nero not willing to listen to words, the only other alternative was action. In admitting that such a thing was impossible, she'd be saying that God was either powerless to stop him from losing his faith or deliberately allowing it by ignoring this chance to help him. Nero was trying to force her to surrender with this lock effect…

"God is not to be tested by anyone…" Spira said to herself, beginning to grow nervous as her face showed her tension. "But I don't believe in a god who values his pride more than his people…"

"You know you're fucked…" Nero responded to his sister's worry in his mind. "Even if you could somehow answer to my challenge, you'd only be rewarding me with the assurance I want. And even after you give your unavoidable surrender and walk away, I'll still get another kind of assurance that's even more gratifying…"

"...THE ASSURANCE THAT THE DEVIL'S POWER IS GREATER THAN GOD'S."

 _What could Spira do?_

As Spira realized that God had not answered her prayer to appear before them, she knew there was only one thing she could do…

"I'm sorry, Nero." she apologized as she knelt her head. "Though I strongly disagree with you, I accept that I can't stop you from believing what you believe. Let's just agree to disagree and move on."

In response, Nero kept up his scowl, giving Spira a glance that appeared to show that he was disappointed. However...he soon abruptly smiled.

"Great!" he exclaimed in a sickly sweet voice. "That's perfectly fine with me. I'm glad you knew when to throw in the towel. It takes courage to be the better person. I'll be honest, I'm totally fine with accepting the reality of "true love"..."

"...?" Spira responded as she looked up, confused about Nero's sudden change of tune. "What are you…"

She then gasped as she saw him smile the most malicious smile she had ever seen...before she saw the devilish grin of an apparition that appeared beside him…

...the apparition of his late mother, Noimman, who spoke through Nero as he finished what he was saying in a demonic tone of voice…

"...BECAUSE I COULDN'T CARE LESS EITHER WAY. IT IS NOT TRUTH AND LOVE THAT RULE THIS WORLD, BUT CONVENIENT LIES THAT PROMOTE FALSE LOVE FOR OUR WORTHLESS, NIHILISTIC BELIEFS AND HATE FOR ANYTHING OR ANYONE WHO DARES TO CHALLENGE THEM. THIS IS WHERE OUR WEAKNESS COMES FROM. AND ONLY THE DEVIL IS WILLING TO GIVE US THE POWER TO COMPENSATE FOR THAT WEAKNESS."

Spira started crying as she realized that from the start, Nero had no hope that she would dispel his doubts. He had already made up his mind that God was no longer worth bothering with. He had already decided to walk the path of darkness, and wanted to prove its power to her. And even worse, she also realized that the reason Nero had come to accept these horrifying ideas as truths...was because God had allowed an evil spirit to take hold of him.

"NNNNNOOOOO!" Spira cried. "GOD, WHY HAVE YOU HUMILIATED ME?! WHY DO YOU FORSAKE ME AND MY FAMILY SO?!"

"Don't ask why he's forsaken us…" Nero retorted. "ASK WHY HE'S FORSAKEN ALL OF THE WORLD! MWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!"

Upon overhearing this, Terra was terrified, and immediately went to her room.

"I have to get that containment crystal ready…" she said to herself. "...NOW! He's already been completely brainwashed by Noimman, even after everything I did to try and bring him up right! But I won't let him stray off the path of good! I refuse to dishonor you...I refuse to dishonor your memory, Leo!"

"...It won't just be on you...I'm still here, Terra…" the ghost of Leo could be heard from inside an area of darkness...


	17. Chapter 17

Episode 17: Light in Hell

 _Just as the Jaegers became the light of hell, the Nightbringers will become the darkness of hell, and show their world a power even greater than Yin and Yang with the help of their queen and king…_

Terra was in her bedroom, holding a crystal ball that held a floating blob of light inside of it.

"I won't betray your memory, Leo…" Terra said to herself solemnly.

She was looking at the crystal ball she held in her hooves as she sat down on her bed.

"How did I overcome the fact that my husband had become a ghost…" Terra told herself, wearing a morbid expression on her face. "It's quite simple, really. When the body dies, the soul lives on. That I've believed since I was very young. But in recent times, that belief hasn't brought me the same comfort that it used to. Maybe because I once thought that when the soul left the body, it was supposed to be free. But now…"

Terra envisioned a dark mist consuming the light inside of the crystal ball.

"...Now that I realize that even the souls of the good can be entombed in darkness despite doing nothing to deserve it…" Terra continued as her tone of voice grew more bitter and angry. "...that solace just doesn't have the same magic that it used to have…"

Terra then grimaced and shut her eyes as she remembered their laughs...the evil laughs of Noimman and King Sombra as the one she loved most was consumed by the darkness...and an even crueler fate was given to the one she swore to protect…

When she opened her eyes, her entire body was glowing with an aura of light.

"I have to make it up to them…" she said to herself sincerely. "I will rectify the wrongs of the past and chart a course of light for the future!"

With that, she made her way to Nero's bedroom, taking the crystal ball with her.

"Get ready, honey…" she told herself in thought. "Mommy's done babying you. I sheltered you too much, and it's time you learned some real world skills…"

After Nero and Spira's "debate" had spiraled into chaos, both of them had retired to their rooms. Spira was on her bed brooding, looking down at her front hooves as she thought of how she was going to cope with this.

"What did I do wrong?" she asked herself in a crestfallen tone of voice. "I thought God would be there with me as I spoke my mind against something that I knew was obviously wrong. Was I wrong in wanting to help my brother see the truth?"

Spira's sadness soon began to turn to anger as she started trying to look at things from another perspective…

"Or…" she said to herself as she started to surmise something more cynical, just as her brother had done. "Have I just not been thinking outside the box? What is the truth, after all? And if God is the truth, why is his existence not clear to me or my brother? It makes me wonder…"

As Spira said that, her body began to emit an aura of light and the apparition of Fluttershy began to manifest beside her. Looking at it, she asked herself for the first time in her life…

"What is this spirit, really?"

In the adjacent bedroom, it was shown that Nero, by contrast, was not so interested in exactly what Noimman, the apparition that was beside him, really was. Just the very fact that he finally had something to believe in that made perfect sense to him, he was completely mesmerized by. Looking at his forelegs, he had a creepy, smug smile on his face as he transformed them into dark energy.

"I'm not afraid of it anymore…" he boasted triumphantly. "I have power now, actual power! Ha ha ha ha ha! And to think there was a time where I thought going to church every Sunday and singing Kumbaya with a bunch of close-minded bores was doing anything for me! It's all just for the delusion of "inner peace". How sad, ha ha ha…"

"I see…" Terra said upon entering Nero's bedroom, overhearing what he had just said and witnessing what he was doing. "So part of the reason this has happened so soon is because you're under a delusion of grandeur..."

"Huh?" Nero responded, turning to face his mother, as Noimman did the same. "What are you going on about?"

"Don't play me for a fool, Nero." Terra retorted indignantly with a serious look on her face. "I heard everything that happened downstairs. You owe your sister a huge apology."

"For what?" Nero asked. "Telling her the truth? Speaking my mind? It's not like I said anything offensive."

"Your words aren't what bugged me…" Terra replied, standing her ground. "It was your intent. You knew that Spira had no chance of "winning" that argument with you, yet you kept rubbing in that you were right to satisfy your own sadistic pleasure!"

"Hmm?" Spira went, overhearing Terra express her grievances to Nero from her room. "Why is Mom mad at Nero? If she knew about the conversation we were having downstairs and had a problem with the way he was acting, why didn't she just put a stop to it right there and send him to his room?"

"Ha ha ha ha ha!" Nero laughed. "This is too rich. So you admit that I was right, yet you tell me I was wrong just because you're assuming the worst of me! Feelings before facts, I love it! Let's just say for sake of argument that I was too harsh on her. Who cares? The world's harsh on everyone that way. Getting them to believe in a lie built up by a long-term con of convenient half-truths before they get slammed with the brutal full truth. I had to go through it, so why shouldn't she go through it too?"

In response, Terra remained silent and her angry expression faded. Something very unexpected was taking hold of her...

"Booya, I'm on a roll!" Nero thought to himself, feeling confident as he saw his mother's expression become blank. However, his confidence soon became concern when he saw his mother start to smile and laugh to herself.

"Ho ho ho ho ho…" Terra snickered. "Don't get so cocky just because you taught him how to debate...Noimman."

"So you can see me…" Noimman retorted as she showed herself floating beside Nero, still smiling unlike him. "Big whoop."

"Oh, it's more than just a "big whoop"..." Terra taunted as she tossed the crystal ball and caught it. "I came to try to talk things out with Nero, but it seems I'm going to have a use for this thing after all…"

"Why don't you go hide somewhere, Nero?" Noimman told her son. "It's high time I taught this fool who dared to humiliate me who's boss…"

Terra then began to chant an indecipherable incantation…

"What in the world is going on now?!" Spira thought to herself from her bedroom. "Is there someone else in there? What is mom doing? ...Huh…"

Spira then noticed that the apparition of Fluttershy next to her was smiling as her eyes began to glow bright white.

"It's finally time…" the spirit of Fluttershy said.

"You can talk?" Spira replied. "And it's finally time for what?"

"For the final two heroes to discover the power of Yin and Yang." the spirit of Fluttershy answered. "Once you two have mastered it and have destroyed the threat that has taken hold of this world, everyone may begin their final ascension towards The Eternal Three through Starcatch…"

One of Fluttershy's memories then flashed through Spira's head, the swirling vortex of darkness and light above a colossal tower...it reminded her of what she had seen in her brother's eyes…

"I get it now…" Spira said to herself in thought. "That's why God has allowed this to happen...the only thing that would drive me to awakening my powers of light was my brother discovering the power of darkness!"

"And that's only part of the reason." Fluttershy replied, her eyes returning to normal. "God is far craftier than any mortal could ever comprehend."

Spira snickered to herself in response.

"Let me guess...you actually are God, aren't you?" she surmised.

"No," answered Fluttershy, "I am only a piece of God. I am a clone of the former God, who longer exists as herself, but as part of the Eternal Three."

"The Trinity?" Spira asked in confusion. "Wait...so...that's how God can exist as a separate entity despite being part of the Trinity? He...cloned himself?"

"It's...not important to ask questions like that." Fluttershy responded with a chuckle. "Even if I gave you an answer, it wouldn't have any effect on the story of your life."

"That _is_ the story of my life." a bemused Spira retorted. "Asking questions that no one in the church wants to answer."

"I know it's frustrating," consoled an empathetic Fluttershy, "but understand that if every question had a clear answer, the story of your life would provide you with no true challenge, no real adventure. It's not that God is just uncaring or incompetent, it's that he wants you to grow on your own. Discover the truth for yourself, so that you will have the satisfaction of being the one who brought your world one step closer to being ready for the spiriting…"

Spira felt a resurgence of hope as she saw what looked like a star gleam in the spirit of Fluttershy's eyes…and then she remembered the look in Nero's eyes again…

"Nero…" she told herself. "I have to help him get back on the right track!"

It was then, however, that Spira realized that things had gotten disturbingly quiet in the other room…

"...The optimist in me says that they worked things out civilly…" Spira said to herself suspiciously. "...But that same optimist also told me that all I needed to do to help my brother was pray and wait for things to work out…"

Spira then walked out of her bedroom, the spirit of Fluttershy still floating beside her, and walked towards her brother's bedroom.

"Regardless of what's happened, I believe it's time to take action…" she thought.

She then entered Nero's bedroom, slowly opening the door to discover a disturbing sight that she did not expect at all...her mother sitting on the floor, staring at the crystal ball with a maniacal look on her face. Noticing Spira's entrance, she began to cackle.

"Ooooohhhhh…" she said creepily as she turned to face Spira. "What a perfect time for you to show up. Now the family is all together. You, me, Nero, and Leo…"

"...L-Leo?" a rightfully uncomfortable Spira replied. "You told us he died…"

"He did," replied Terra in an ominous tone of voice, "but he never left us. There was a time I thought he did, but I now see the error of my way of thinking. I don't blame myself too much, though. After all…"

Spira was taken aback as her mother held out the crystal ball, revealing that there was a dark mist inside of it...a dark mist with the face of her brother…

"IT WAS YOUR SELFISH BROTHER AND HIS BITCH OF A MOTHER WHO KEPT HIM FROM US." Terra told her in a maddening tone of voice.

"W-what are you talking about?!" Spira yelled. "What did you do to Nero?!"

"I gave him a well-deserved time-out." Terra replied, still speaking in a creepy tone of voice. "This is his punishment. This is what he deserves not just for what he said to you, but for what he did to my husband…"

"Huh?" Nero responded from a dark area. "Yeah, what is she talking about? A time-out? Is that what she calls it?"

"So you sealed him in crystal?!" Spira questioned, still indignant. "For how long?!"

"Until further notice." Terra answered. "Do you have a problem with that?"

"Yes!" Spira exclaimed. "Just because Nero's been acting out doesn't mean you have to treat him like he's some evil demon who needs to be locked away!"

"...Spira?" Nero asked himself. "You're standing up for me? Even after what I did to you?!"

"Ho ho ho ho ho!" Terra laughed. "Come on, I raised you better than this, Spira! You can't be this gullible! Nero _is_ an evil demon. He was born that way!"

"What?!" Nero exclaimed to himself in thought. "She knew the whole time?! That cunt!"

"Mom…" Spira said in astonishment. "You have to be joking. Please tell me this is part of some cruel, sick joke. If that was true, why did you never tell us for all these years? No one is born an evil demon, all of us have a chance of salvation. That's the entire reason we go to church. That's the entire reason you brought us there, to save us from falling victim to the world's evil. Because you love us. It's because you love us that you wanted us to know the truth."

Upon hearing those words, Terra became silent for some time, as she could see something in her daughter that she hadn't before, something that she herself desired. She eventually responded to her daughter by saying…

"Yes. That's right. How could I have ever forgotten that? How could I say such a horrible thing about my own son?"

"?!" Nero went in response. His sister was equally surprised at how easily she relented.

"You...you mean it?" Spira asked suspiciously, wondering if this was like the trick Nero had pulled on her earlier. "As in, you truly believe that Nero is not a demon?"

"Of course I don't really think that," replied Terra in a remorseful tone of voice, "I just caught up in my emotions as I thought back to the tragedy that happened with your father. Nero is a good soul, he has just been corrupted by the dark forces that have taken hold of him. And now that I can see in you what I see now, I realize that you're the only one who can save him…"

A wide, hopeful grin was made on Spira's face as she realized what Terra was talking about…

"You can see it, can't you?" Spira asked as the spirit of Fluttershy beside her gave Terra a friendly wave.

"No way…" Nero remarked to himself. "She has power just like mine...incredible...I'm actually impressed..."

"Indeed I can." Terra answered as she returned the smile and bowed her head in respect. "I am beyond impressed that you were able to convene a spirit of light that exemplifies God. Most ponies in the church never even come close to such a feat, especially at such a young age."

"Most ponies also never come close to summoning a spirit of darkness at their side or transforming part of their body into pure energy…" Nero commented to himself in frustration, now miffed. "No bias here…"

"Please don't flatter me." Spira replied, blushing. "I don't really feel like it was any work on my end. God is the one who deserves the credit for allowing an emissary of his to work through me."

"Aaaaawwwww…" Terra went. "And you're completely humble about it too. You truly are a model devout. I really don't feel an apology is enough for how I acted now. So how about this? Since Nero still owes you an apology, how about I let you be the one to decide when he goes free?"

"Tee hee hee…" Spira chuckled naughtily. "I won't deny it, I do like that offer. I'll make sure to let Nero go as soon as he's learned his lesson. Now that I have real power that I can show him, I'm sure it won't be long before he sees the error of his ways…"

At first, Nero growled in frustration at this mockery. He thought about saying something, but after thinking it over, he started snickering to himself as he got a better idea…

Terra then handed over the containment crystal to Spira, who happily took it in hoof.

"I did it…" she said to herself jubilantly, making her way out of the bedroom as she held the crystal up. "I have real power now...and I can use it to help the world!"

However, as Spira went out into the hall, she felt something very off about the Fluttershy spirit beside her. Her happiness turned to worry as she saw the spirit's eyes turn green and ooze a purple haze as they met contact with the crystal.

"Sombra…" the spirit of Fluttershy said. "That's not your brother...that's King Sombra!"

Spira realized she had been tricked after hearing Fluttershy's warning, and immediately dropped the crystal, which fell to the floor but didn't break due to having magical protection. However, she too fell to the floor after she felt a needle enter the back of her neck. Collapsing to the ground beside the crystal, she watched in horror as the spirit of Fluttershy was taken from her side and absorbed into the crystal ball.

"6500." Terra bluntly stated a number as she walked over to her daughter, kneeling down and pulling out the needle. She showed to her daughter that it was attached to a syringe that had injected her with a poison that had paralyzed her. "Do you have any idea what that number represents?"

Spira didn't answer, only giving her mother an angry look. She had been deceived again…

"It's about the amount of days in seventeen years and nine months." Terra explained. "Just let that sink in. The amount of time I've been around you kids, including the amount of time you were in my womb, is only a fraction of the amount of chances I've had to kill you. And why does that fact not horrify you? Because you believe that I love you and would never do such a thing. But that amount of time also shows just how long you've been believing a lie…"

"Why…" Spira grumbled furiously, only having the chance to say so much from the poison in her throat. "Why, why, WHY?!"

"If it makes you feel any better, I intend none of this for evil." Terra told Spira as she took the crystal, tossing it and catching it as she stood up. "I hid the truth from you kids because I never wanted you to get involved with the demon shit that killed my husband. But those fools in the church failed to keep even my son pure, and now it is time for them to pay… With the combined power of light and darkness, I will be able to conquer the world!"

Terra laughed evilly and walked away as Spira continued to struggle, but soon passed out, unable to fight the poison any longer.

"No…" Spira said to herself in the darkness. "That is not my mother. My mother is not a cartoon villain...she's possessed...she has to be possessed...how did she even know about Yin and Yang?! But what's the point if I'm powerless? What's the point if God won't lift a finger to help me or stop this?!"

 _Heh heh heh...don't ask God to do the devil's work…_

"Huh?" Spira said in response to those words as she awoke to find that it was nighttime. She was still lying on the floor, having not fully recovered from the paralysis yet, when all of a sudden, the unconscious body of Terra was dropped in front of her. "W-what…"

"Splendid." Nero complimented his sister, looking down at her, holding the crystal ball Terra had taken with levitation magic. "I saw everything that happened under the cover of the shadows. The spirit of my real mother taught me how to hide in them, and I see that you too have learned how to communicate with your soul parent. I'm not being sarcastic, I sincerely mean it when I say that you deserve praise for showing me that there is power in God. That helped me realize that Satan intended for _her_ to be my target, not you. I guess I really do owe you an apology now..."

"What happened to Mom?" Spira asked as she looked at her mother and saw that her eyes were without pupils. "What did you do to her?"

"I took her soul…" Nero answered. "I imprisoned it somewhere she won't escape from until she learns her lesson. If you want to use her terminology, I gave her a time-out. Is that a problem?"

"...No." Spira replied, suppressing her suspicions as she realized that she had no proof that Terra was possessed. Even if Nero was lying, he had the upper hand, so she begrudgingly took him on faith. However, this situation did remind her of something Terra said that had been bugging the hell out of her…

"Leo…" Spira said impulsively as she looked up at Nero. "Our father...Mom was saying something about her husband...did you have anything to do with him disappearing?"

"Nothing that I know of…" Nero replied in a suspiciously playful tone of voice. "My soul parent, Noimman, didn't tell me much about him...but she did tell me about King Sombra and why I look so much like him...the truth is, I am the one destined to rule over this world as the king of darkness...just as you are the one destined to rule over this world as the queen of light, right by my side…"

Spira gasped as she felt a reaction coming from the crystal ball that had absorbed the spirits of Fluttershy and King Sombra, which Nero looked upon with a confident grin.

"I believe it's time we took our rightful places as king and queen…" Nero said brazenly as he levitated the crystal ball down to his sister, then turned around and began to walk away. "Take that ball and follow me whenever you're ready…"

"You're...not going to take it for yourself?" a confused Spira questioned. "Or destroy it so that it can't be used against you? Why?"

"I simply don't need it," retorted Nero, "nor do I fear someone using it against me with the power I have now. So I may as well save it for whatever may come up in the future. In the meantime, just hold onto it for yourself and I'll say you owe me and the devil one for lending you the power you need to rule."

Nero continued to walk away looking smug before he heard his sister fight to stand up and say…

"Take it back…"

"Hm?" Nero responded in puzzlement, turning around. "What, is it something I said?"

"No…" Spira replied, ignoring Nero's joke and holding out the crystal ball. "You know what I mean, the ball. Take it back. I don't want to owe you for giving me power. I don't owe the devil anything!"

"Sorry, but I'll have to decline." Nero answered, walking back to Spira, still smiling. "You're welcome to pay back your debt any time you wish, but denial of what Satan has done for you will only hold you back. After all, Satan is God and God is him. And until you grasp that concept, how can you ever combine light and darkness…"

Spira's eyes widened and she trembled at the sight of Nero transforming his right foreleg into a ball of dark energy and his left foreleg into a ball of light energy. Bringing his forelegs together, the balls mixed to form a spiraling sphere of energy that expanded and exploded, blowing Spira back and having her sliding across the floor.

"...as I can." Nero finished.

"You…" Spira mustered the strength to say, despite being hurt. "You've already…"

"That's right." Nero replied, his forelegs returning to normal. "I've already mastered the fusion of Yin and Yang. And I'm waiting for you to do the same. I'll take the crystal back...but only after you show me that you can make a blast like that. MWA HA HA HA HA HA! AH HA HA HA HA HA!"

After Nero walked away laughing maniacally, Spira retreated to her room. Not only had she been humiliated thrice now, she had lost both her mother and her brother to the darkness in the same day. Rightfully, she was furious. The only thing giving her comfort at the moment was what she saw in the crystal ball. Watching the spirit of Fluttershy shine in the spirit of Sombra's dark mist that enveloped her gave her hope…

"He lives in no light…" she said to herself sadly. "He lives in hell now...and I feel sorry for him…"

Spira then started to cry, gaining the attention of both Fluttershy and Sombra.

"I am going to follow him…" Spira continued to say to herself. "I'll follow him to the deepest part of hell if I have to. If God won't save him, then I will. I will…"

Spira grabbed the crystal ball, and on impulse, began releasing spiritual energy from her aura and pouring it into the ball. Inside the ball, Fluttershy and Sombra's spirits began to mix together, forming a sphere like the one Nero had made. The sphere soon burst, creating a flood of energy that poured out of the still intact crystal and into Spira, who finished by saying…

"...be his light in hell…"


	18. Chapter 18

Episode 18: Soul in Shadow

Nero and Spira were walking through Princess Celestia and Luna's throne room. For more than seventeen years, their world had been without rulers…

...rulers that their world knew about, at least. Most had forgotten who their rulers were. Most had forgotten who was really running the show, willing to settle for the mere illusion of freedom. They had given up on making their own stories, and had allowed the two most mischievous gods to write their stories for them. Allowing them to tell them how they should live their lives, how they should react to their issues, even how they should think and feel. Like the world of Myra Michaels, this world too had been invaded by demons and evil forces from beyond. And while the church of Pies had used their influence to spread doubt of their existence to the people, Nero and Spira's eyes had become open to their ruse. Now that the world's rulers knew of their awareness, they had requested an audience with the two…

"Ha ha ha," laughed Nero as both he and Spira looked upon who had been leading the world in Celestia and Luna's absence, "so this is the face of big brother. A ninja and a monster dressed like a priest. How cute and appropriate."

Of course, the ones sitting upon their thrones were none other than Ninja Time God Rarity, wearing her garb that had an emblem of a sword on it, and Fantasy God Discord, wearing a white robe that had the emblem of a shield on it. Ever since the night Akame had been defeated after Celestia and Luna had been killed, they had been involving themselves more with the world of the heralds, establishing their reign to the knowledge of their royal subjects while keeping the rest of the world in the dark. Once they saw ponies in the general public arriving at the scene of the battle's aftermath and learning of their existence, they knew they had a cover story to prepare. Things needed to be edited, including the minds and memories of others…

"Yes," replied NTG Rarity, "cute and appropriate. Just like you two."

"What do you want from us?" Spira asked. "Are we to have our memories doctored for knowing too much? If that's what you're planning to do, you may as well kill us because we're not going to stand for you lying to our people."

"Essentially…" Nero interjected as he prepared a ball of dark energy in his right hoof with a menacing smile on his face. "...prepare to fight if you want to do anything funny…"

"Does that include telling jokes?" FG Discord retorted. "Ho ho ho ho ho!"

"You don't have to beat around the bush," chimed in NTG Rarity, "we know what you want to do. You want to defeat us and take the throne for yourself. I'm afraid there are two major flaws with that plan, however."

"Yawn." Nero made a rejoinder. "Like I haven't heard this one before. Just tell us what the other one is besides "the fact that we can't beat you"."

"Actually," replied FG Discord in a cheeky tone, "the first flaw is that you can't beat us unless we allow it. Huge detail you overlooked there. But the second, more important one that you overlooked is that we have no intent to fight for the throne because we don't want it."

"Huh?" Spira and Nero both made a confused response. "What are you talking about, I thought you needed this position of power to control the people!"

"Did you really think that our influence over the masses has anything to do with the fact that our asses are sitting in these chairs?" NTG Rarity scoffed. "To tell you the truth, we've been trying to get our asses seated into something more comfortable for quite some time."

"We already have power that comes straight from the ruler of the universe." FG Discord boasted. "A job like this that only gives us domain over one world is merely a side chore for us that we're better off without. Nearly eighteen years of this shit is enough, even for all-powerful gods like us..."

"Wait, so you called us over here to pass the buck on us just because you're bored and lazy?" an annoyed Spira and Nero retorted.

"Exactly!" NTG Rarity and FG Discord exclaimed, both wearing wide, cheerful smiles on their faces. "So have fun with the job!"

With that, FG Discord clicked his fingers, and he and NTG Rarity vanished with puffs of smoke. Both Nero and Spira had confounded, irritated looks on their faces as they sat on the thrones the idiosyncratic gods had left behind, and still had the same looks on their faces they had back then as they recapped this story to the Helllights and the Nightbringers…

"So that's how it happened?" a perplexed Gordon asked. "They called you in so they could give the throne over to you?"

"I...suppose that's what went down." an equally perplexed Nero replied.

"What oddballs." Vincent chimed in. "I'm not too shocked, however. The impression I got from them the night we first saw them was that they were the "chaotic and comical" type of evil."

"The kind who don't want power, fortune, or glory…" Ricard solemnly interjected. "They only want to watch the world burn…"

"Honestly, you can't really expect much more from psychotic, omnipotent, cosmic deities." Trish voiced her thoughts. "I'd be bored with no one to match my power myself."

"Speaking of matching power," intervened Vergil, "I'd like to address the big picture…"

"Yeah…" Dante followed along. "Though those gods haven't committed any recent atrocities that we know of, they're obviously still a threat. Not only have they been leading so many to live a lie for all these years, manipulating the general public, they were also able to manipulate all of us, including Akame. And she was the strongest villain we've ever fought."

"Oh, you ain't seen nothing yet, hee hee hee…" Nero thought to himself, fighting the urge to chuckle evilly. While he was able to disguise what was really on his mind from the soldiers, Spira felt a bad premonition.

"Nero…" Spira said to herself in thought, concerned. "I hope you're not thinking what I'm thinking. That the reason you're looking into the secrets of this world and the powers that be in it is not to protect the people, but to prove that you and the devil are the strongest…"

Even though both the Helllights and the Nightbringers couldn't read Nero like Spira could, they still didn't know if they could put their full trust in their king. And even though they remained silent, their facial expressions showing no feelings or ideas of disloyalty, Nero already had an idea of what they actually felt…

"You can hide it all you want…" Nero thought. "But I know from experience what people like you tend to think of me. You can even respect me and still have legitimate doubts about my integrity, believing I am a shady character. Not that I blame you. I also trust no one...and it's the truth that I am not trustworthy myself. Still, I need both you and the masses to view me as a reputable figure, or else my entire plan will be ruined…"

Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord, knowing what was going on inside his head, chortled to themselves.

 _Are you getting bored of all this talking? I'm getting bored of all this talking._

NTG Rarity said those words as she and her partner set eyes on the church of Pies.

 _Ditto. I feel that we owe the fans some action...I just hope this isn't too much fanservice for our good friend Nero, ho ho…_

FG Discord said those words in a foreboding tone of voice as he got out his book and pen.

 _Don't speak as if we're just doing this for him. You know as well as I do how we want to see him react to this._

NTG Rarity told that to FG Discord.

 _Oh, I know we're not on his side or anyone else's. I just love to bring everyone in on the fun…_

Back at Nero and Spira's castle, they had dismissed the Helllights and the Nightbringers, who were now returning home.

"You know," said Gordon, "there's always something that bothers me about King Nero. Does anyone else feel the same way?"

"You may as well be asking if ponies eat hay." Vincent retorted. "Not just us, every guard in the castle tells me that he gives them the creeps."

"It's strange…" Ricard interjected. "I never get the impression that he's evil, but nothing about his demeanor tells me that he's good either."

"Heh, that wouldn't be a crime to me." Dante made a rejoinder. "I don't believe in anyone being "good or evil", I just believe that all of us have a good side and a bad side. What really matters is how you express that good side and bad side. Some choose to do it in a way that's constructive, others in a way that's destructive."

"Since you said what was on my mind well enough," chimed in Trish, "I'll add that the problem with our king is that he's not expressing either side to us at all. He's hiding something and believes that we're too stupid to find out for ourselves what it is."

"And that's where the action comes in…" Vergil spoke in tandem. "I believe that our king has already discovered the kind of strength needed to take down those insane gods. The reason he is withholding the information on how to acquire that power from us, I believe, is to keep the source of his strength a secret. But unfortunately for him, I've already done research on what I think that source is...the unity of light and darkness."

With that being said, everyone stopped dead in their tracks, distracted by what they couldn't believe…

Meanwhile, Nero and Spira were eating lunch together at the royal table with fellow nobles. While Spira didn't seem too thrilled, along with the other guests at the table, barely touching their food, Nero was happily helping himself to one of Princess Luna's old favorites…

"Ah, this roast pork is simply divine!" he proclaimed. "Such delicacies are best shared with friends!"

The confused nobles just stared and watched as they muttered to themselves things like…

"I didn't know our king wasn't even into eating etiquette…"

"I didn't even know we ate meat…"

"Aren't pigs people too? Wait...is it okay to call ponies people? Should I call the pigs ponies?"

After finishing chowing on the cut of pork, Nero looked at his quiet and unenthused sister and guests and chortled.

"Why is everyone so reserved?" he remarked cheekily. "I thought you were here to have a buffet, not a study session over coffee at a cafe!"

"Brother…" Spira addressed Nero, saving one of the guests the trouble. "We have not yet said a prayer…"

"Prayer?" Nero cockily retorted. "What, are we having lunch after a church service? Who would I be praying to and for what?"

Spira slammed her front hooves on the table and pulled her chair back in annoyance.

"Please excuse my brother and I…" she requested of the guests of the table as she left. "This lunch is temporarily postponed. Please come with me, brother, I must speak to you alone…"

Despite being just as confounded as the nobles now, Nero followed Spira outside of the dining room and to the hallway outside of their bedrooms.

"Don't keep me in suspense too long…" Nero continued to speak sarcastically. "What did I do that was so vile you couldn't tell me about right then?"

"You know it's not just one thing…" Spira replied. "It's the way you act in general that's concerning to me."

"Another favorite of mine, generalization." Nero made another rejoinder. "Just write me a list of everything I've done wrong, why don't you?"

"I could…" Spira played along with the joke. "...but I don't want us to be here all day. Besides, you shouldn't need me to be telling you what you've done wrong. Don't tell me you can't see how scarfing food at a royal banquet without even saying a prayer first can be seen as discourteous."

"I don't give a shit how others "see what I do."." Nero replied, growing more serious and firm in his tone. "You should be with me, not against me, in standing up for what we want to do instead of pandering to everyone. Our "happy Sunday school days" in church are over. We make the rules now, and we are not obligated to please anyone."

"So you're saying you don't want our people to be happy?" Spira asked.

"If they're not happy, then what are we supposed to do about it?" Nero answered. "If you don't mind forcing yourself to be something you're not to please them, fine. But I'm sick and tired of it. It's not in my nature to have friends. It's not in my nature to click with others. If I can't even get anyone to like this "fake me" I have to be, what's the point of trying to get them to like the "real me"?"

Spira silently gave her brother a gloomy stare before she shook her head and said…

"Oh Nero...your understanding of the problem I have with you is entirely wrong...I'm not mad at you for only half-heartedly lying to everyone about who you really are...I'm mad at you for lying to everyone in the first place! Why do you think I would ever want you to be so dishonest and complacent that you would actually rather just be someone you're not instead of finding the courage to be yourself?!"

Nero couldn't counter what his sister had told him. If everything what as it seemed, she would've hit the nail on the head.

"She still doesn't believe that I'm a monster…" he told himself in thought, shaken and sad. "Why...why after every shady thing that I've done does she still have hope in me?! Is it wrong for me to just tell her how screwed up I actually am? Or is it wrong to lie and have her believe that everything's okay? Why…"

Nero then began to clutch the back of his head with his front hooves in frustration before lifting his head up and bellowing…

"WHY DOES EVERYTHING HAVE TO BE SO FUCKED UP?! JUST GIVE ME AN ANSWER ON WHAT'S RIGHT AND WRONG!"

All of a sudden, Spira and Nero could hear one of the guests breathing heavily from behind as he came out from the dining room to get to them in the halls.

"Oh shit…" Nero said as he turned to the aghast noble. "Listen dude, what I said was just an overreaction. We weren't discussing anything serious, I just got a little carried a-"

"DEMON!" the hysterical noble abruptly shouted, interrupting Nero and sending a chill down his spine.

"It's happened again…" he thought. "I couldn't keep my mouth shut again, and now I'm going to pay for it...AGAIN. My words...WHY IS IT ALWAYS OVER MY WORDS AND THE STUPIDEST LITTLE THINGS I DO?! WHY CAN'T I JUST TAKE SOME-"

Nero was interrupted again, this time by a scene of blood...to the horror of both his sister and him, the noble was stabbed in the back through the chest by a red demon clad in black scales.

"HEE HEE HEE!" the demon cackled evilly, looking at the noble with his claw in his chest. "GO ON! SCREAM YOUR HEAD OFF! LET IT RIP!"

The poor noble couldn't scream, gasping for air in fear and pain before the demon brought his hand up to tear through the noble's body even more, bringing his hand out through his head and killing him.

"But that's fine too…" the demon mocked the dead noble who collapsed to the floor, bleeding all over the carpet. "I DON'T MIND DOING THE RIPPING FOR YOU! MWA HA HA HA HA!"

The demon then turned to taunt the asphyxiated Spira and Nero.

"What's the matter?" he scoffed. "Are you just going to let me and my friends kill your subjects? You're more useless than them if that's your plan…"

However, Spira and Nero's paralysis from shock came to an end when they saw something that woke them up...it was the dead noble's soul leaving his body, only to be grabbed by the demon that killed him…

"Because at least these weaklings will provide us with nourishment!" the demon proclaimed as he gave the soul a terrifying glare. "MWA HA HA HA HA!"

Upon seeing the soul, Nero felt a strange sensation course through his body as he impulsively licked his lips…

*BANG* *BANG* *SPLURT*

"Action." Nero finished the thought he couldn't finish earlier as a new scene of blood took place before his eyes. The demon now laid dead on the floor before his sister and him, killed by a shot from a gun that went through the bottom of his jaw and blew his head off. Spira had manifested the spirit of Fluttershy, who had fired an explosive bullet from a familiar red and white-striped gun at the demon, by her side.

"Hmph." she went as she looked over at her brother and reacted to his demeanor. "You know you can't fight these guys like that."

"Bah…" Nero responded in frustration, even though he knew that what his sister was referring to wasn't his character, but his ineffective action against the demon. He had transformed his right foreleg into a gun to shoot the demon in the forehead with a bullet of compressed dark energy. It had proven to be of minimal help however, as the bodies of demons were composed of dark energy, proven by the red, bloody mess the dispatched one made on the carpet dissipating into dark mist.

"Yeah…" Nero said to himself in a demoralized tone of voice. "What was I thinking? Mom would never take on a demon with a gun…"

Despite painful memories of his evil soul mother, Noimman, cackling as she committed murder, Nero realized that he would have to fight at full strength in order to save the souls of his subjects...he had to take action…

*SHING*

In the dining room, the friends of the murderous demon were laughing as they looked upon the corpses of the other nobles. All of them had fallen prey to the demons, who had ripped through their vital organs with their deadly claws. They had also cut off their heads and limbs, putting them on plates in preparation for a feast of their own. Seated at the dining table, they devoured the pony flesh like Nero had devoured the pork earlier.

"Hmph." one of them said in dissatisfaction, blood dripping from his mouth. "Meat isn't enough."

"Agreed." another one concurred. "After all the shit that's gone down with losing Akame, then Noimman, and all of our comrades constantly getting killed by Myra and friends, there's no way we can even the score just by tearing up and eating the flesh of a few mortals…we need to take away something from them that's immortal..."

"Well," chimed in another one giddily, "seeing as they've not yet departed to the Dark-"

*VROOM* *CLASH* *CLANG* *SHING* *SHING*

The demon was suddenly interrupted by Nero dashing across the table at lightning fast speed, having slipped into the dining room undetected with shadow travel. He had propelled himself across the table and spun himself around like a top to cut all the demons at the table to pieces, using his own forelegs that he had transformed into blades of dark energy. Blood and remains of the demons' heads and upper bodies flew everywhere before they landed in various areas, melting and dissipating into dark mist.

"They may safely depart to the Dark Sky now." Nero said solemnly as he transformed his forelegs back to normal. "But they can stay here too if that works better for them. Unlike you fools, they haven't overstayed their welcome."

Still lingering, the souls of the dead nobles had seen Nero in action, and in response, were both fascinated...and frightened.

"Our king disposed of those abominable monsters so easily...using the power and technique of a monster. Who is he really?"

Nero could feel the same sensation from earlier course through his body, and he got a crazed look on his face as he licked his lips again…

"I can sense them…" he said to himself giddily. "They're not showing themselves out of fear for me...which is a good thing, because I don't know what I might end up doing if I see them…"

Nero felt himself entering some sort of trance as he began to salivate and think about the thrill of absorbing new power into himself…

"NERO!"

Nero snapped out of it as he heard his sister yell from behind. Turning to look at her, he saw that she had a serious expression on her face.

"We both need to be on full alert here!" Spira exclaimed. "Just because we've killed the demons here doesn't mean we're out of the woods! There's no way they'd just attack the dining room of the castle and call it a day. There must be others somewhere else wreaking havoc!"

"You're right." Nero agreed with his sister's surmisal. "I almost wish I had left one of them alive now so that I could interrogate it, but it's too late for that anyways. Regardless, there's no way both of us can leave the castle unguarded to go look for them if they were able to do something like this while we were here. I hate to doubt our men, but I don't think they'd be enough to protect the castle if a swarm of them were to show up. We need to recall some of our best soldiers. One of us needs to find the Helllights and the Nightbringers and get them back here!"

"...Tactically, that seems like the best action…" Spira replied, despite being hesitant.

"He is correct…" Spira told herself in thought. "But I have a bad feeling about leaving him alone, in both scenarios. If I send him out to get the Helllights and Nightbringers alone, he might do something crazy with them...but if I leave him here alone with those souls…"

"So what do you say, sis?" Nero asked. "Should I get them or should you?"

"...I'll get them." Spira answered. "If I have to aid them in a fight they're caught in, I feel I'll be more compatible as backup."

"That's fine with me." Nero replied. "So long as we both do our best to protect everyone, we'll brave through this!"

"Right!" Spira exclaimed. "Best of luck to you!"

It was then that Spira put her front hooves together, one brimming with light energy and the other with dark energy. In a flash, she disappeared, teleporting out of the castle.

"It's not just that I don't trust him alone with the Helllights and Nightbringers…" Spira said to herself as she began the search for them. "I also don't need the Helllights and Nightbringers distrusting him if he can't control himself around them in the heat of battle. He's better off alone in a place we both know…huh?"

But what Spira couldn't have predicted was the terrifying phenomenon taking place right over another place that she and Nero both knew…

"Is that a vortex…" she asked herself in horror as she saw the spiral of light and darkness in the sky. "...over the church of Pies?!"

Spira also couldn't have predicted that the Helllights and the Nightbringers were going to need help from both of them if they were to overcome the challenge NTG Rarity and FG Discord had prepared for them to face...she would have to face who her brother was really…

"Oh, Mom...Dad…" Nero said in a chilling tone of voice. "Please forgive me...I wish it didn't have to be this way...I wish that I wasn't a demon...I wish I didn't have to...EAT YOU."


	19. Chapter 19

Episode 19: The Real Demon

"I'm the only one left who knows what really happened to them…" King Nero said to himself in thought, snickering evilly. "How did it all transpire?"

Nero tried to think back to how he ended up consuming the soul of Leo, his father, but failed to recall any clear images of exactly what happened.

"Don't know why that is…" Nero continued to talking to himself. "I only know I consumed him from what Mom told me. Well, that, and the fact that I can still feel him inside of me, heh heh heh heh heh…I'm disgusting…"

An image of Leo in darkness flashed through Nero's mind, revealing the dark area he had been in the entire time was none other than his own son's stomach…

"Reminding myself of this is only making me feel more out of place…" Nero started questioning what was going on in his head. "Why the hell am I thinking about all this now? Is it a thing of pride? Do I have to prove to myself that I'm not afraid of the truth? That I don't have to lie to myself about who I really am? At this point, I may as well just start admitting to myself that I'm not just always dying to eat souls...I'm also always dying to…"

"Kill…" the spirit of Noimman finished as she appeared beside her son. "You've inherited my bloodlust. I saw it in your eyes that night...you wanted to kill her...you wanted to kill your own mother, just to prove you were stronger than her…"

...There was a pause before Nero replied with…

"Yes. No. In my own selfish desire, I wanted that. But part of me also wanted to stop her from hurting anyone. However, I also selfishly enjoyed the fact that I had the perfect excuse to take my revenge on her for what she tried to do. Though part of me also felt genuine sympathy for her...knowing it couldn't have been just her and that someone was manipulating her…"

Nero then had a flashback to the night he had confronted Terra after she had knocked Spira out and stolen the crystal ball…

"Mwa ha ha ha ha ha!" Terra continued to cackle evilly to herself in the hallway, tossing the crystal and catching it. "Finally, I can take my vengeance upon that hack of an exorcist and his sham of a congregation! And _she_ will smite the wicked...mua ha ha…"

Terra's sinister laugh was soon interrupted, however, by the abrupt appearance of Noimman's spirit in front of her.

"Oh dear, that won't do…" Noimman teased. "After all, we're both wicked…"

"Don't you dare compare me to the likes of you!" Terra exclaimed angrily as she formed a ball of light energy in her free hoof that she prepared to use against Noimman. Suddenly, however, she found herself unable to move both of her front forelegs. Looking at her front hooves, she realized both of them were wrapped in dark energy acting like rope to tie them. A dark shadow was beginning to creep up her chest, and in horror, she dropped the crystal ball. Appearing out of the shadow on her body, Terra felt chills all throughout her very being as she gazed upon the face of her son…

*HISS* *GRRGH*

Terra trembled as she saw what her son had become, looking into the same, endless spiral Spira had seen. In spite of her fear, she garnered enough energy to ask Noimman…

"What have you done to my boy?"

"Don't talk to her…" Nero interjected, angry at being ignored. "Talk to me. I'm the demon who is about to take your soul. I'm the only one to blame for how I ended up this way, and that's irrelevant anyways. All that matters right now is stopping you…"

"No honey…" Spira replied, regaining her energy to speak from her emotions of incentive. "It's not your fault you ended up like this! It's Noimman's! It's Sombra's! It's mine! I should never have gotten you kids involved with that awful church! I thought they would rid you of the darkness inside of you, but instead they enhanced it!"

"Hmph, I said talk to me, not try to talk your way out of this with bullshit." Nero retorted in disbelief. "Does, "YOUR SELFISH BROTHER AND HIS BITCH OF A MOTHER ARE TO BLAME", ring a bell? I heard everything you said to Spira, so don't treat me like an idiot."

"That wasn't me talking!" Spira yelled in defense. "I felt something come over me when I came in your room. Before that, I only intended to use the crystal ball to soothe you with my own light for a short while to suppress the demonic power that was taking control of you! I didn't mean to use it to seal you away!"

"Likely story…" Nero bemusedly replied with sarcasm. Surprisingly, however, Noimman did not share his doubt, grinning with intrigue at something she could see beside Terra that Nero could not…

"You do have to ask though, son…" Noimman chimed in. "Where do you think she got that syringe from?"

"Huh?" Nero responded as he looked over at the syringe in the back of Spira's neck and remembered the syringes Noimman used in her laboratory. "Wait, you don't mean…"

The scene then shifted back to Nero in the present day, as he realized now what Noimman was trying to hint at…

"Yata…" he thought to himself in shock. "It was Yata that whole time! He possessed Terra! But how?! And how is it that only Noimman could see him?!"

 _Because...Yata is Noimman!_

As Ninja Time God Rarity exclaimed that in Nero's mind, he remembered what Yata had told him about "wanting to become more like God and Noimman", and just like that, everything started coming together…

"NO WAY!" Nero bellowed. "ALL THIS TIME!"

"Uh, sire…" one of the ghosts of the nobles said with concern. "I mean no disrespect, but are you feeling well?"

"Oh, sorry…" Nero apologized, embarrassed that he had made that mistake three times now, blurting out what was on his mind in the heat of the moment. "I shouldn't have shouted like that…"

"It isn't just that…" another one of the ghosts interjected. "You've been mumbling very strange things to yourself for the past ten minutes…"

"We even heard something that sounded like, "I didn't want to have to eat you, Mom and Dad."..." another discomforted ghost chimed in.

Nero was astonished, his face red with embarrassment over how out of touch he had been with the real world, especially during a time such as this.

 _Don't be so abashed...everyone gets a little too into their own fantasies every now and then...it's only when you become so comfortable in your own imaginary perception of the real world that things become a problem…_

Fantasy God Discord said those words in Nero's mind, to which Nero was careful to only respond in his head and not out loud with…

"So are you trying to say that I'm deluded, or…"

 _No, you are very much aware of the fact that something is very wrong with your world. It's how you react to the fact that's of great interest to us._

"So my abrupt shouting greatly interests you?" Nero joked. "Would you like to do a full breakdown and analysis of that tired old running gag?"

 _As much as I love a good comedy of errors, I'm afraid the greatest error you perpetuate is no laughing matter. You are clearly NOT comfortable with your delusion of reality, your fake self that has to be civilized. You no longer believe in it, yet you keep on playing that character you hate because you feel obliged to. Now, what does that remind me of, hmm?_

"Twilight Sparkle…" Nero replied bluntly. "Noimman did tell me some things about her...and from the impression I got of Twilight when I met her, they seemed to be true. But I fail to see how Twilight and I are anything like each other, at least in terms of personality."

 _You never fail to keep us intrigued. Of all the heroes we've assigned for this project, you are the one who is most like Twilight in just about every aspect. You burden yourself with much self-loathing pride, you have a strong commitment to justice and peace despite your glorification of death and darkness, and most notably, you have no idea who you are, lost in an endless sea of convenient half-truths about yourself as you search tirelessly for your true identity._

"...Tell me who I am." Nero responded after a long silence, still talking to them in his mind and trying to stay calm despite being extremely hurt. "If you know so much, why don't you brag to me about something I actually care about knowing?!"

 _Oh God, the worst way to sass someone is with something that isn't even true. You tell yourself every day who you are, a demon in denial, yet you refuse to pay the fact much attention because it's too difficult to acknowledge._

"...So what you mean to tell me is that I was wrong…..for neglecting the wrong….." Nero answered as his face contorted into a blank, yet unnerving expression. The ghosts of the nobles took note of this, and after having witnessed Nero just standing around and doing nothing in silence for several minutes, they were even more worried now than they were before that something wasn't right with their king…

"What do we do?" one of them asked another ghost in the group. "If we ask him what's wrong, he's just going to deny it…"

"While I'm just as curious as you are about what's wrong," answered the ghost, "I think our top priority should be getting out of here. We may no longer be able to die, but I don't feel safe…"

"Me neither." another ghost chimed in. "Those demons are a new level of batshit nuts. After they tore up our bodies like they were paper, I truly believe they were serious about not being satisfied with just ripping up our flesh. Don't you find it odd how none of us seem to have a powerful grudge or belief that we need to remain in this world, yet we still linger?"

"You don't think…" the ghost who began the discussion replied, catching on to what he was surmising. "...that it's not our grudge that's keeping us in this world, but the grudge of those demons refusing to let us go to the afterlife?! Haven't they done enough?! Christ, why THE FUCK do those monsters even exist?!"

Nero overheard this...and still wearing his frightening, emotionless expression, began to move closer to where the ghosts were…

"Sire?" the same ghost who yelled what had struck a chord with their king asked. "Is something the matter?"

"Would you like the truth, or would you prefer a convenient lie?" Nero answered with a question. "There was a time where I thought for sure the answer was latter, but now I really don't know. I really don't know what you all want from me anymore, so why don't I just kill my heroes and show you that who I really am...DOESN'T CARE WHAT YOU WANT."

The ghosts felt a terrifying chill that froze them to the soul as they looked into Nero's eyes and saw that spiral...that mortifying spiral…

"GIVE ME ALL YOUR HATE...AND I WILL _EAT IT_." he declared in a demonic voice the next time he opened his mouth…

"RRRRRAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!"

The screams...of demons could be heard from the church of Pies. Just as Spira had feared, they had attacked another place beside the castle, the church she and Nero used to go to. When Spira arrived at the church, she was relieved to see that the Helllights and Nightbringers were already there to counter the invading devils. Vincent and his subordinates were dealing with the ones at the entrance, with Vincent wielding a sword and spear, slicing up demons with one weapon while skewering them with the other, and Gordon and Ricard using their ghostly powers to possess the demons and have them fight against each other. Smirking as she saw the demons' numbers already dwindling to almost nothing, she jokingly asked…

"Need any help?"

"I think we're good." Vincent facetiously answered as he pierced his spear through the last demon's lower jaw and head. "It's generally safe to assume that when you're done taking out the trash, the job of hauling it off to the dump to be incinerated is already taken care of for you."

Spira chuckled as she got that the dump meant hell, but as she watched the demons disappearing into dark mist, her expression became serious again as she pondered something...

"Is it just me, or do any of you find something about this off?" she asked the Helllights.

"Off?" Gordon replied. "In what way? Does it have to do with them showing up at the church, a holy place? I think it's only coincidence, just like how there are demons _and_ ghosts here now…"

"Though I'm surprised by the first time I've witnessed you _trying_ to be funny while bringing up a good point," chimed in Ricard, "I agree. I've yet to see any signs of any correlation of their abrupt appearance here to an ulterior agenda. Unless...you know something that we don't..."

Spira's memory was triggered, thinking back to what they wouldn't know regarding the church…

"The last time I talked to my mom about the church," she told them, "she seemed to be very upset with them. She talked about how they had failed her and allowed my brother to become-"

Spira stopped herself as she realized that she was about to tell them about her brother actually being a demon.

"...a shadow of his former self." she decided to tell them instead. "I'm sure you've picked up on the darkness that lies within my brother's heart. He's never been the same since the last day we went to church as a family. Since then, my eyes have become more open to the evil in this world, and I fear that this "holy place" is not as holy as the church leaders want the goers to believe. I became especially concerned when the gods Nero and I told you about mentioned something about "manipulating the general public"..."

"Oh…" Vincent replied, catching on. "Oh...so you think that there's a correlation between those lunatic gods and this likely lunatic congregation…and even if there isn't..."

Vincent and the others then looked at the church with suspicious glares on their faces before Vincent finished by saying…

"...it's sure as hell worth investigating…"

The Helllights and Spira then entered the church, passing through the lobby and going into the auditorium where the service was held. There, they saw the Nightbringers, sitting around a church that was in shambles. The benches and the podium had been cut to ribbons during the fighting, the corpses of Pinkie Pie and Maud Pie clones who were killed in the conflict were all over the ground, and blood was splattered on the walls and floor.

"Oh my God…" Spira reacted to the sight with dismay and sympathy for the casualties. "If only we found out this was going on sooner…"

"Don't feel any guilt." Trish shared some words of comfort with Spira, seeing her distraught reaction. "I communed with the spirits of the ponies who died. They departed peacefully, and from what I know, no one's soul was eaten by a demon."

"Though we were very happy to see that there were survivors," interjected Vergil, "there was one bystander who wasn't exactly innocent…"

Vergil then got up to reveal that lying behind him was a Pinkie Pie clone who had been tied up with ropes of blue spirit energy created from Vergil's aura and had an elaborately colored cloak tied around her head. She was giggling profusely in a creepy way that had Spira and the Helllights feeling uncomfortable.

"What did she try to do to you?" Spira asked in concern.

"She attacked us." Dante answered bluntly as he flicked a syringe. "She tried to nail me with a poison-laced needle from afar while we were trying to fight the demons. Even though poison has no effect on us, her cowardly tactic pissed me off, so I happily agreed to Trish and Vergil's suggestion to torture her for information."

"Damn, he does not bullshit…" Spira and the Helllights thought in response to how upfront Dante was about it.

"Before you ask," interjected a perceptive Trish, "no, she did not suffer too much. If anything, I felt like I was the one being tortured with how she actually seemed to enjoy my lightning strikes…"

"She gave up everything we wanted to know very quickly." Vergil continued. "It wasn't very engaging. I didn't even have to break an organ or defile anything sacred."

"Uh…" Spira and the Helllights replied in confusion.

"It's not what you think." Vergil clarified. "I only meant the church's treasures. She caved in when I threatened to destroy that."

Vergil pointed to the church organ...on which, a surviving Maud Pie clone was playing off-key while saying in a dull monotone…

"Daddy, do you want some sausage? Daddy, do you want some sausage?"

"I think the pieces of the puzzle on why our king is the way he is are starting to fall into place." Dante suggested. "And I don't just say that because of stuff like that...the Pinkie Pie clone we interrogated shared some very insightful bits of information with us...not just about Nero, but also about you…"

Dante said that while looking at Spira, to which she responded…

"...Me? What was she saying about me?"

"She told us that neither you or your brother are of this world, but of one beyond." Dante explained. "That you're here to ensure the success of some project called, "The Spiriting", using the help of spirits you call Noimman and Fluttershy. Is that true?"

"WHAT?!" Spira yelled in her mind. "How could an ordinary Pinkie Pie clone know something like that? Nero and I haven't even told anyone about our mastery of combining Yin and Yang yet!"

"Hee hee hee!" the Pinkie Pie clone laughed in an ominous way. The Nightbringers reacted by rolling their eyes in annoyance, but Spira was deeply bothered…

"It isn't like them to resort to torture either…" Spira thought. "That Pinkie Pie clone definitely has a link to not just my family's past, but also the past of those gods…for now, however..."

"Yes." Spira begrudgingly answered Dante's question, trying to think of a way she could use this unprecedented turn of events to help her brother. "I don't know much about "The Spiriting", other than vague details given to me about it from Fluttershy, but it's true that Nero and I don't belong to this earth. In fact…"

Spira bit her lower lip and clutched her front hooves, trying to pluck up courage to say what she was about to confess…

"Nero and I have always believed that the reason those gods gave up their thrones so easily is because they had always planned to make us the rulers of Equestria, from the day they first conceived us and this world!"

Both the Helllights and the Nightbringers were taken aback...by Spira acting as if she had disclosed something truly scandalous.

"That's it?" Dante retorted. "Hell, we already kind of had that figured out. Why do you think we would be mad about that?"

"Because of our dark history." Spira explained. "Princess Celestia and Luna died, Leo died, my mother had her life ruined! All so we could be the regents of this land! Don't you feel that we should be ashamed?!"

"No." Vergil bluntly replied. "That's what those asshole gods did, not you. You're only giving them what they want if you blame yourself."

"Those who are that wicked are not afraid to use detestable tactics such as emotional and moral manipulation." Trish spoke from personal experience with Akame. "It's part of their scheme to keep you under their control, to make you hate who you are…"

"..." Spira gasped as she finally understood why her brother was the way he was.

"I get it…" she thought as she flashed back to when she was confronting Nero in the hallway. "I really do feel I get it now. When I saw that Nero was having a mental breakdown over me calling him out on what he did after I essentially told him that I wanted him to be himself, I was so confused. I thought he was just stubborn and didn't want to listen to me. But no, he was just as confused as I was...his mind's been so ravaged by all the confusion of what "being good", "being evil", and "being himself" really means that he's losing his mind! How could I not have understood that?! In the state of mind he's in, there's no way he can be left alone with souls!"

"Look," interjected Dante, "I respect that it's your business, not mine, if you want to be sorry for something you shouldn't have to apologize for. But let's stay on tangent, is there anything else you have to say? Anything else we need to know? We have no problems with you or your brother being Equestria's leaders and we respect you as our superiors, but if you aren't completely honest with us, we can't help you take down those gods."

Spira's mind began to race and her heart pounded faster as she realized there was no way out of it. She would have to tell them the truth about Nero…

"Alright then, I'll tell you." Spira conceded. "My brother is…"

"Possessed by a demon!" the Pinkie Pie clone abruptly shouted to finish her sentence. "Worry not, however, there's no need to fear! For I am an exorcist!"

Everyone turned to the Pinkie Pie clone with a bemused, blank look on their face and after a long pause, said…

"...Really?"

"You doubt my power?" the Pinkie clone replied. "Or is it that you just wouldn't trust me around your king? Nero and I go way back, believe it or not. I can still remember when he was just a young colt...his mother brought him to me to perform an exorcism on him to seal away the evil that was trying to take hold of him. And now that he's reached adulthood, that same evil has resurfaced...you've seen it, haven't you? The spiral…"

Everyone else felt a chill down their spine as they remembered the spiral that was in the sky…

"That's right…" the Pinkie clone continued. "That spiral is the mark of the seal I put on Nero when he was a child. I can tell, however, that it has weakened over time. Just like the dark king Nero embodies, the evil energy within him finds a way to escape through his eyes...the spiral represents infinity...that even in a realm where evil is continuously denied, it will continuously exist as an infinite loop that refuses to end until it opens the gateway to another world…"

"ENOUGH!" Spira yelled. "You talk a big game, yet you give us no reason to put our trust in you! Just because you know so much about my brother doesn't mean you should be trusted to do anything with my brother! Nothing you say is going to stop me from telling them the truth!"

"Well, since the truth is that it was those demented gods who made your brother the monster he is, fire away." the Pinkie clone jeered.

"..." Spira fell silent as she felt the pressure from everyone around her, their eyes locked on her…

"...No." she told herself. "I can't do it. I can't sell Nero out. I've never believed that he truly is a monster. I have to have faith in him. He only chose the dark path because of the devil who influenced him. No matter what happens, I must remember that he is not my enemy…"

"That's correct." Spira relented. "Everything you've told us, I do believe. But can you prove yourself trustworthy?"

"Absolutely!" the Pinkie clone exclaimed as she abruptly broke Vergil's spirit energy binds and untied the fashionably colored cloak around her head, to everyone's shock. A red magician's hat suddenly appeared on her head as she put on her cloak.

"Wha...how…?" Vergil stuttered, flabbergasted.

"You never had me trapped." the Pinkie clone taunted. "I never intended to kill Dante, although I could've easily overpowered him any time I wanted. I let you capture me because I wanted to see the way you would talk amongst yourselves if you thought you were running the show. I'm glad to know that I'm not going to have to force you to let me help…"

"...Well, at least your power appears to be the real deal…" they responded as the Pinkie clone pulled a beaker filled with purple liquid out of her cloak.

"You think?" the Pinkie clone retorted as she threw the beaker against the floor. Everyone was teleported back to the throne room of the castle in a puff of purple smoke, where King Nero was sitting on his throne...

"What the fuck?!" he shouted before the smoke cleared and he saw Spira along with everyone else. "Oh, you guys are back. What, were you trying to put on a show for me?"

"Not all of us, only I." the Pinkie clone interjected. "I am the one who intends to give you, my liege, the greatest show unearthed…"

A skeptical Nero examined the Pinkie clone and got a strange vibe from her. However, it was not him, but another force inside him that burned with anger upon remembrance of her…

"YOU!" the voice of Terra could be heard yelling from inside Nero. "YOU'RE THAT EXORCIST!"

"M-Mom?!" Spira exclaimed.

"EVERYONE, GET AWAY FROM THAT MAGICIAN!" the voice of Leo could now be heard yelling from inside Nero. "THAT'S NOT AN ORDINARY PINKIE PIE CLONE! THAT'S ONE OF RARITY AND DISCORD'S SUBORDINATES! HE'S THE ONE WHO DESTROYED OUR FAMILY!"

"D-dammit!" the magician yelled. "This wasn't part of the plan! Nero was supposed to have digested your souls by now! Oh well, lesson learned. Never trust a failure of a demon!"

Nero felt intense rage burn throughout him after everything he had heard, but decided not to respond…

*SHING*

...with words, at least. Using the swiftest movement he had mastered, he propelled himself off of his throne and sliced the magician's head clean off with a foreleg he manifested into a blade of dark energy. As the magician's head flew and splattered against the wall, creating an odd, cakey substance when it suddenly exploded, Spira and the soldiers looked upon the king in shock.

"Nero…" Spira said in astonishment, trembling. "Your power...is the source of your strength…?"

"IT COMES FROM THE SOULS." Nero replied coldly, without hesitation. "I WILL NO LONGER FEEL ASHAMED ABOUT BEING WHAT I AM MEANT TO BE. I HAVE ACCEPTED THAT I AM A DEMON...AND I SHALL NOW FIGHT AS ONE!"


	20. Chapter 20

Episode 20: Spiriting the Darkness

 _Lost…_

 _I forgot who I was…_

 _Getting stronger, I was willing to accept…_

 _Hell...I am finally awakening from…_

 _Towards the beyond, reborn, I now seek what you see right before you…_

"So King Nero has finally come to terms with who he truly is..." Ninja Time God Rarity said, setting up a cliffhanger at the beginning, rather than the end. "But will he ultimately choose demonic power or true salvation? Find out next time on the finale of Dragon Ball Z!"

"Though I'm more into Jojo's Bizarre Adventure these days," replied Fantasy God Discord, "I'm every bit as excited as you. However, depending on how things go, there might not even be a next time for a finale…or at least that's what we'll tell them, ho ho..."

FG Discord clicked his fingers, and a piece of paper magically appeared before them. Both of them looked at it with sneers, already knowing what was on it from being the ones who wrote it. They then looked down at the castle they were hovering over from the clouds, and paid special attention to the roof of the place Spira and Nero now resided in…

"Since already knowing who's going to end up being declared the strongest under the heavens is too boring…" NTG Rarity remarked.

"...we're going to have to shake things up for the sake of those over the heavens…" FG Discord continued. "And no, that is not a Jojo reference…"

"Oh my God!" NTG Rarity exclaimed in response to the tired old joke...as she shouted what she did like Joseph Joestar would. Both of them shared a hearty laugh before FG Discord interjected…

"And that reminds me of our lackey, our favorite little cake demon...do you wonder too how Mr. Baker is dealing with Nero and friends?"

Inside the castle, the cakey substance that was splattered against the wall from Nero decapitating the Pinkie Pie clone began to slide off the wall in a foreboding way. None took notice right away, however, as everyone was completely focused on Nero after what he had just said and done…

"What do you mean, Nero?" Spira asked the inevitable question. "Why are you calling yourself a demon?! Why do you want to be like one?!"

"It isn't about what I want…" Nero solemnly answered. "It's about what I have to accept...even if I don't want to be a monster, I can't change the truth. This is the way God intended me to be...a demon. I am the darkness. I crave death. I crave souls. I can only deny these evil feelings, not the fact that I feel them. And there is nothing that can change that fact...nothing that can change me…"

"That's crap!" Spira angrily retorted. "I don't even care at this point if this is the way you were "meant to be"! You don't have to be this way if you don't want to! I'm sorry that I made you feel that you couldn't love who you were, but no one is forcing you to be someone you hate! And if there is someone trying to tell you otherwise, direct us to them so we can show them that they're wrong!"

"Oh Spira…" Nero replied bemusedly. "How can you not see it? You are the one trying to tell me otherwise…"

"What?!" Spira yelled.

"Let's just say that everything I've said up until now is completely wrong, and everything you've said is completely right." Nero compromised. "What difference does it make? Am I still just going to have to continue on suppressing what I really feel every moment of my life? Am I still just going to have to look everyone in the eye and commit the sin of lying to them for the "greater good"? Am I still just going to have to live an unhappy life for the sake of their false comfort?"

"No!" Spira exclaimed. "Never! I already told you before, that's not how I want you to live!"

"That is where you end up in _your_ dilemma, then." Nero said coldly. "Because at least I've finally accepted myself while you still can't accept me. If you still want to deny that I am a demon…"

Nero, still with one of his forelegs transformed into a dark blade, got into a fighting stance…

"...YOU BETTER COME AT ME BACKED UP WITH SOMETHING GOOD."

Spira looked at her brother, remaining silent as she watched his dark aura pour out. She felt she was reliving that moment when she had first fought with him at their mother's house all over again...as she shut her eyes in prayer once more…

"Appear before us and show us the way...not my way, but yours…"

However, unlike back then, Spira had completely put aside the personal interests in her mind to make room for the interests of the one she believed in…

...This is what the one she believed in made clear to her…

 _I am not what you see and know not_

 _I can not be covered or discovered_

 _For I am the darkness and the light_

 _I am the unknown who knows all and makes all known_

 _Including I, whom once known, can not be made unknown_

 _For how can the known be made unknown?_

 _The known only sleeps inside all of us, waiting to be risen_

 _Just as the dead only sleep to tide the wait to be reborn_

 _But I am not what is risen and reborn_

 _I can not sleep or die_

 _For I am the eternity and the truth_

 _I am what always was and what will continue to be_

 _That which sight and knowledge can not ignore_

 _If they attempt, they give me a false form_

 _You are the one I ask, "Which one is not me?"_

Spira instantly thought of Fluttershy and what she had talked about, and slowly but surely, started to realize the trick before she answered with…

"All of them. All is one, all is one that is not you. It is one that must become all, all that is within you."

"You have answered wisely," replied the one she believed in, "even as I have given you a riddle with no answer, a puzzle that can not be solved. Yet it clears the minds of those who seek me, making them realize that I am not a puzzle. I am not the question of the moral dilemma, but the solution. You need not ask me questions, for I am the answer…"

This caused Spira to remember talking about the times her questions would be rejected by people in the church, which she discussed with Fluttershy…

"I think I got it now." she said in self-reflection. "It wasn't you who had something to hide, it was those who didn't really know you who had something to hide…"

After remembering what Fluttershy was telling her about Starcatch and Nero, she realized what had to be done…

"It is the one who pretends to be you that must fall…" she spoke out loud, looking at Nero. "The one who is deceiving all…"

As Spira held out her front hooves, which glowed with a bright light, Nero grinned in excitement.

"I take it you want to fight this out…" Nero said gleefully, his aura of darkness growing larger. "Am I not mistaken?"

"..." the Helllights and the Nightbringers donned looks of disapproval on their faces as they turned to Spira…

"Yes." Spira answered bluntly. "We will have no choice but to fight."

"Are there any conditions you wish to set?" Nero asked in a creepily cheerful tone.

"There are." Spira replied. "First, we have to both swear that we will not kill each other. Second, you must swear that if I am to win, you will let every soul inside of you free. Do you find either of those conditions unreasonable?"

"Ha ha ha ha ha!" Nero laughed. "Not at all!"

"Huh?" Spira went, as the Helllights and Nightbringers also shared her confusion at how quick he was to submit to her demands in such a nonchalant manner. "You...don't have any objections?"

"No, just one question." Nero answered, still smiling. "If I win, what's in it for me? You can offer me whatever you wish."

"How bizarre…" Spira thought. "Why is he being civil and submissive to a fault? Even if he just feels that he's certain to win, what motivates him to be so diffident?"

"It doesn't take a genius to tell that I have an ace up my sleeve…" Nero mused in thought. "...thus why I've prepared two aces in the hole, thanks to my "friends"..."

"He knows I'm aware of what he wants…" Spira told herself in thought. "And if the circumstances were different, I'd offer him what he wants without hesitation, but...I guess I have to be the one to double down after all…"

"If you win…" Spira began to speak, realizing she would have to disregard how the warriors would react. "...you can have my soul…"

Nero's creepy grin grew wider than ever, and after sticking his tongue out impulsively, he told her…

"IT'S A DEAL."

"HOLD IT!" the Helllights and Nightbringers yelled, grabbing Spira and Nero's attention. "Don't we have a say in this too?!"

"Indeed you do," responded Nero, still maintaining his oddly calm and composed approach, "our monarchy is no patriarchy. We are open to letting the opinions of the people influence our decisions. Isn't that right, sister?"

"...Yeah." Spira answered, still puzzled. "It is ultimately our right, but I want to see what they think too. So what do each of you feel about this?"

In response, everyone else in the room voiced their thoughts on the situation…

"Don't get me wrong," said Gordon to Spira, "I am all open for a civil...fight, but if you were to lose, you should have no obligation to hand your soul over to your brother. Let's just call this off and focus on working together to find a way to defeat those gods."

"Honestly," interjected Ricard, "I fail to see any reason for this battle. I have no qualms regarding allowing Nero to remain our king, so long as he is kept in line. Besides, like Gordon said, he's not even the true enemy in all this. More than ever now, we need to work with each other, not fight with each other."

"Sorry guys," said Vincent to Gordon and Ricard, "you're cool kids, but there is no way I am going to accept that our king is a demon. Maybe a fight is unnecessary, I can't deny that, but I refuse to stand for false peace. I fail to see "the other side of this" when this situation is so black-and-white. Our queen needs our help to take down this monster. If we are going to come together, I say we impeach Nero. Who's with me?!"

Vincent exclaimed that while holding out a foreleg with a wide smile on his face, only to be disappointed by no one else raising their foreleg in agreement. Trish sighed.

"I almost feel sorry for you." she remarked in bemusement. "I thought the trauma you experienced with your wife and child's death would make your view of a situation like this more mature, but rather, it has clouded your judgement."

"Say what?!" Vincent angrily retorted. "I am not childish or wrong for speaking out against a demon and wanting you guys to do the same!"

"You are oversimplifying the situation." Vergil interjected. "Prioritizing feelings over facts may not be wrong, but it certainly does not work in the real world."

"...Alright then…" Vincent replied with a frustrated growl. "Elaborate on what you think the situation is…"

"The situation is that we need every bit of power we can get if we're going to defeat those nutjob gods and get our land back to the way it was." Dante explained. "Getting rid of Nero would be the stupidest thing to do right now, as he just might be the strongest one out of us all. Even if you hate him with all your heart, there's no denying the fact that we need him."

"How insulting!" Vincent retorted. "Why would we ever need the help of a devil to take down the devil?! If there is someone we should be getting help from, it's Spira! All of us should be helping her stop her brother before taking down those gods ourselves and proving the power of good! How it will always triumph over evil! How the hell am I in the wrong for wanting us all to stand up for what's right?!"

All the other warriors sighed, growing weary of this conversation. Spira felt sorry for Vincent…

"He must harbor a grudge against my brother for consuming Captain Leo's soul." she thought. "And while I understand his frustration, I have a strong feeling that incident happened much differently than he believes it did…"

Nero also felt pity for Vincent, albeit for different reasons…

"Holy lord, this guy is a complete basket case!" he thought. "Is he so insecure in his opinions that he needs to treat his idea of what's right and wrong as fact and expect everyone else to just go along with it? As much as he pisses me off, I pity him. Guys like that always get played for suckers before the real world throws them out like dishwater. I'd love to give him a nice wake-up call, but it's not worth it. The truth is best saved for the grave, heh heh heh heh heh…"

Eventually, Dante decided to try leveling with Vincent in a different way.

"Look," he began, "if things really were as black and white as you say they are, we'd be all for your proposal despite our personal thoughts on the matter. Our opinions are secondary no matter what's really going on, and it's a fact that Nero could help us do something that will help us make everyone happy. This has nothing to do with "who's right", this is about doing the best we can for what's right."

"But then you have to ask yourself, does anyone really know what's right?" Ninja Time God Rarity asked in a hearty tone of voice.

"And is one so absorbed in their own idea of what's right really deserving of knowing the truth and sharing in the fruit it brings?" Fantasy God Discord asked in a sly tone of voice.

"YOU!" the warriors yelled as they jumped back and struck a fighting pose in response to the abrupt appearance of their foes.

"And of course, only now do you actually acknowledge our existence, ho ho." NTG Rarity taunted. "It amuses me so, how distracting conversations like this are to mortals."

"Even when you're well-aware of who's really in charge, debating about a puppet is so much more engaging!" FG Discord teased. "How pathetic!"

"Ha!" Nero exclaimed. "I'll tell you what's pathetic! Spending all your time playing around with us just because you have nothing better to do! I would think such prestigious gods would be more preoccupied, but it turns out even I'm busier than you!"

"Well, it is your "big day" after all." NTG Rarity replied, unphased by Nero's taunt. "Though I'll have you know that playing around with you is merely part of our job...especially on everyone's "big day"..."

"What do you plan to do?" Spira asked seriously, still having flashbacks of what Fluttershy talked to her about. "Is this about the ascension through Starcatch? The spiriting?"

"Both." FG Discord answered. "After all, yours and Nero's story is the last one to take place before everything either ends on a silent note or a new dark sky is allowed to be created…"

After FG Discord said that, the cakey substance that had slid off the wall was now beginning to react strangely, appearing to be growing larger…

"And that's to be determined...by the outcome of our battle?" Spira assumed.

"Very right." NTG Rarity responded. "May the winner be determined by what's best for everyone…"

NTG Rarity then clopped her hooves together twice, causing Spira and Nero to vanish and reappear on top of the castle.

"...by everyone else…" FG Discord finished what NTG Rarity said as he turned to the warriors with a sinister look in his eyes...his eyes that showed spirals like King Nero's...

 _It's finally time they all knew the full truth of what this spiral really means…_

As he began this explanation, King Nero took off his purple robe and stretched back in preparation for the fight, revealing the spiral seal on his stomach that the exorcist had mentioned.

 _It doesn't simply represent an infinite evil that will open the gateway to another world…_

As NTG Rarity said this, the reflection of light moving in the shape of a spiral could be seen in Spira's eyes as she saw light energy fill the outline of the seal on her brother's stomach…

"So that's how you were able to master the fusion of Yin and Yang so quickly…" Spira remarked.

 _It also represents an infinite good eternally intertwining itself with an infinite evil...and only that will create the gateway to another world…_

As FG Discord explained this, his words were proven to be true, as in the sky above Spira and Nero, the spiral that had been seen earlier was now beginning to rotate very quickly. It formed a vortex just like the one that had been seen over Starcatch...before the top of the tower of Starcatch began to emerge from it. Both Spira and Nero were awestruck as they looked up at it, knowing for sure now that everything the spirits inside of them had told them about it was true.

"I feel...energy coming from the tower…" Spira told herself in thought. "Spiritual energy...could there be souls inside of there? The spiriting is linked to that tower, I just know it!"

"It's glorious...mwa ha ha ha ha ha!" Nero declared maniacally. "Just like I remember...only this time, when I go to it again, I'll be able to show my "master" who's boss…"

"You've...been there before?" Spira asked in confusion. "When?"

"Does it really matter when?" Nero retorted. "Like I told Twilight...time is endless."

"Who's Twilight?" Spira asked, still perplexed.

"The one the spirit who inhabits me is born from." Nero explained. "My "master" created her from Twilight's soul. They're both part of The Eternal Three…"

Spira then remembered what Fluttershy had told her once more...this time, she recalled what Fluttershy said about being a piece of the The Eternal Three...and after finally putting everything together...she felt true rage course through her body for the first time in her life…

"OH. FUCK. NNNNNOOOOO!" she bellowed furiously as she released an extremely radiant aura of light from her body before she charged at Nero. Nero sinisterly sneered, easily dodging the first punch she threw at him with her right front foreleg. He kept up his sneer as he then easily ducked under a kick Spira threw with her right back foreleg, then easily rolled to the side when Spira tried to turn it into an axe kick. He proceeded to use this opportunity to trip Spira, cutting her back forelegs with a dark energy blade as he rolled. Spira fell backwards, an opportunity Nero took advantage of to tackle her from the front and pin her to the ground.

"Tsk, tsk." Nero mocked as he held a foreleg transformed into a dark blade to her throat. "You're out of practice. It didn't take me long at all to get you in such a precarious position."

"How did you dodge all those attacks so easily?" Spira asked, showing surprisingly little concern for her disadvantageous state.

"You're asking me what the secret of my ability is?" Nero retorted. "At a time like this? If you must know, it's because I am shadow. Your body is exuding great amounts of light, which extends shadow. All I had to do was transform the part of my body you were targeting into dark energy, making avoiding your blows easy."

"Very clever…" Spira complimented him. "But don't forget that darkness makes light grow brighter...your style of fighting works better from a range…but as for close combat..."

Spira created two balls of light with her front hooves, which were so bright from the shadow Nero created in looming over her that Nero was blinded, giving Spira an opening to shove him off her and stand up. Nero jumped back and growled at her as he felt a burning pain in his chest from being shoved while her hooves had magic exuding from them.

"You're crafty yourself, I admit." Nero returned the compliment. "Because I was blinded, I didn't know exactly where you were going to strike, thus I couldn't utilize my dodging technique. I still have the upper hand here though, as a one-time trick like that won't work again…"

"True." Spira agreed, again not shaken by the prospect of being the underdog. "The odds are still in your favor. However, the match is not decided until only one of us is left standing."

"Well then…" Nero replied forebodingly as he licked his right foreleg that he had transformed into a dark energy blade. "...how about we have this next exchange decide the match...by seeing who gets knocked to the ground first…"

"I'm ready whenever you are…" Spira declared as she held out both her front forelegs, bright balls of light energy shining in both front hooves.

"I'm finally going to get to see my faith be rewarded by you honoring your commitments…" she thought with a smile on her face.

Around this time, the Helllights and the Nightbringers had come to a terrifying realization. They trembled as NTG Rarity and FG Discord sneered while holding the paper from earlier in front of them.

"You...you want us to help decide…?" they said with a stammer.

"The fate of the entire universe?" NTG Rarity nonchalantly finished. "I don't see why that horrifies you so much."

"If it's because you're afraid of making a foolish decision that might jeopardize others, fear not!" FG Discord pretended to provide them solace. "We do that all the time, ho ho ho!"

"So that's why he was so quick to agree to Spira's conditions and listen to our opinions…" they mused, referring to Nero. "Because he believes you have his victory guaranteed!"

"Well, not exactly." NTG Rarity replied. "Nero strongly considered the possibility of us stabbing him in the back as we're technically doing now. He believes that even if he's fated to lose, he should try to defy that fate…"

"But alas, that is impossible." FG Discord deviously gloated. "Just like with Twilight… Our word is final. So our question to you is not just, "Will you betray your king in the name of "justice"?", but also, "Will you choose God to save your world or Satan to save the universe?"."

The Helllights and Nightbringers were speechless. They had never been asked a more difficult question. The decision NTG Rarity and FG Discord had metaphorically described to them was the decision of who would win the battle above…

...would it be Spira or Nero?

They had to pick either one or the other. There was no option to choose a tie or another winner. How could they ever make such a decision? Who was there to help them? It seemed that the only one who could possibly help was someone who had also been forced to make a choice like this once...but no mortal with such experience was there…after all…

"I was only a former mortal for a very short while before I was given a decision to make very much like this one…" a _god_ from behind said. "...and even now, I suffer the guilt for choosing what I thought for sure was right as my friends and I all agreed. The decision that my comrades and I were given wasn't given to us by these gods however...it was given to us by their boss…"

Fluttershy chuckled ominously to herself as Spira, the one her spirit was inside, made a swift lunge towards her brother. Nero, after having taken a step back to rev himself up, spun himself towards his sister with his dark energy blade ready. Spira projected the ball of light from her right front hoof at her brother's head. A seemingly startled Nero stopped spinning and grabbed his face with his left hoof in pain, leaving his chest vulnerable to Spira's next strike. However, as Spira swooped in to hit him there, Nero's chest simply became dark energy that stretched away. Nero guffawed, as with Spira unable to connect her attack in time, she was left wide open…

*SHING*

Spira stopped her attack as she solemnly looked up at her brother, smirking at her menacingly as he watched blood trickle down her face from her forehead. He had stabbed the very tip of his dark energy blade into his sister's forehead.

"You realize what this means, right?" Nero boasted. "I win. If I didn't have to obey your conditions, you would be dead right now. So give up and declare me the winner."

Spira's once serious look contorted into a wide smile before she gracefully told her brother…

"No, I refuse. The match is not over yet. The winner has not proven theirself just yet..."

"HA HA HA HA HA!" Nero laughed louder than ever. "Are you serious?! Are you really that desperate?! Talk about a loser's excuse! What, you think it was just luck that I was able to dodge that attack? Why do you think I came at you with one blade instead of two? I intentionally held back, allowing you to get a shot in so you would relax your guard and give me the perfect opening! Still, I'll humor you. Why do you think I've not won yet? Tell me."

"Because you've yet to show what you have to show." Spira replied, still grinning. "This was never a street fight, after all. This was a battle of vows. And if you had broken your vow in killing me when you had that chance, you surely would have lost."

"You're every bit as naive as you were back then if you truly believe that." Nero retorted, referring to Spira during the first fight they had at Terra's house. "Battle of vows? There is no battle that is won with honor and integrity. Not in the real world. If you believe otherwise, whatever. But what I don't understand is how well you're taking this. Doesn't it wound your pride that I could have killed you?"

"No." Spira answered, unmoved. "I'm just glad that you didn't. And I'm especially glad that you never planned to..."

Spira's smile beamed greater than ever as she finished her sentence with…

"...and never will."

Nero was completely different upon hearing his sister say that, his smile fading. Thinking back to how his sister never believed that he truly was a monster, he said to himself in thought…

"So that is what you believe in after all...not a false god who uses lies of false justice to put meaningless chains on us...but a loving, eternal spirit who wishes to free our souls from the darkness…"

 _At this moment, the outcome of the battle was clear…_

"I surrender." Nero told Spira as he retracted his dark blade away from her forehead, restoring it to the form of his foreleg. "Even if I made you give up, there would be no point. I wanted to fight the Spira whom I believed was misguided...but I see now that that Spira has changed…"

Nero then began to turn and walk away, but just as his sister had done that night, she called out to him…

"Stop. It's not over yet."

"Hmm?" Nero responded as he turned back to her. "Oh yeah, that's right. I'll fulfill my promise of freeing the souls inside of me...that is, if they want to leave. Believe it or not, I never forced them into my stomach. They all willingly offered themselves to me for their own personal reasons."

"That's not what I meant…" Spira said in dissent, to Nero's surprise. "There is so much more I want out of you, my brother…"

And at that moment, Fluttershy made a sigh of relief. A short while later, she sent a message to Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord in their minds saying this…

 _Feel free to tear up that paper and bring the soldiers here to see the victor claim the spoils of battle. The winner turned out to be our favorite after all…_

NTG Rarity and FG Discord snickered to themselves, knowing what she meant. Happily ripping up the fiction they had written on the paper, knowing it would never be reality now, the Helllights and Nightbringers shared in their joy as they realized that their choice to win had been declared the victor of the battle. As NTG Rarity and FG Discord teleported them to the roof of the castle, they went to congratulate the winner…

...King Nero.

"...What?" Nero had asked his sister earlier when she told him that he had won. "How did I win? I forfeited."

"Don't you remember what I said about this being a battle of vows?" Spira retorted. "The moment you resolved not to kill me, not because you had to, but because you truly didn't want to is the moment that you won. In that moment, you realized that upholding your vow to righteousness and your faith in the true God was more important than proving to me that you were right about living the way you do. There's no way to surrender a battle you've already won."

"So by goading me, you were just testing me..." Nero realized. "I'll even bet that you never planned to win from the start, which is why you never used Yin and Yang…"

Upon saying that, Nero made the crystal ball Spira had given back to him when she eventually mastered the art of combining light and darkness, interested in reminiscing. Suddenly, he noticed that the spirits of Fluttershy and Sombra that had taken residence in Spira's body were now being drawn out of her and pulled towards the crystal, where they were sealed.

"If I had relied on their powers to defeat you in a fight and take the throne all for myself," explained Spira, "I'd merely be playing right into their hooves. For they would take control of me and lead this world down the wrong path. So instead, I chose to lead the entire universe of the Dark Sky down the correct path. Though I can defy Fluttershy's will, I can not stop the spiriting from happening, for that is the will of The Eternal Three. Brother, we are still not strong enough to go up against those who are leading the universe astray...do you know now why I offered you my soul if you won?"

Realizing all the sacrifices his sister had made and what he would have to do, Nero started to cry…proclaiming from the bottom of his heart, he called out...

"I love you, Spira! I'm sorry that I ever believed you didn't!"

Nero then begrudgingly opened his mouth to draw Spira's soul out of her body and towards him, consuming it and swallowing it tearfully. He continued to weep as his sister's body slumped to the ground, and her soul descended into the abyss of darkness that was his stomach...but his tears soon subsided when he felt a warm, comforting light radiating inside of his stomach, causing the spiral seal on it to glow. He then began to feel a multitude of such lights beam all throughout him before they departed by passing through his stomach, leaving through where the seal was and causing it to fade behind them. All the souls he had consumed, his father, his mother, and the nobles, were leaving…

Watching in awe as the souls of the nobles smiled before fading away, finally departing to the afterlife, and as the souls of Leo and Terra floated by his shoulders, putting a hoof on each, Nero asked Spira…

"How did you do this?"

"I am combining my own soul of light with the darkness that was sealed inside of you." Spira answered. "No longer will you be a demon who needs to eat souls, but a greater being whose source of nourishment is the combination of light and darkness that creates the essence of the true God…I'm not sacrificing myself for you...I'm sacrificing myself for us..."

"...my family…" Spira finished as Nero finally smiled a joyful grin, one that Terra and Leo shared.

"I guess we were good parents after all…" they thought. "...to have raised such good kids who learned from our bad mistakes...a world that they're leading…"

They then left to return to their old house as they finished their thought with this…

"...is one we would love to linger in for a long time…"

And now, King Nero could finally look upon his sister with full appreciation and love. Though her body was unconscious, she had a beautiful smile on her face. He could even see that the wondrous white hair and mane she never showed off symbolized the humility of her pure soul of light. He then looked over at his soldiers, and marveled at how they were able to see what his sister truly wanted, even as they explained to him that they had help from a god...a veteran of the Awakening project who had worked under NTG Rarity and FG Discord…

...Joseph Baker, the God of Science. Remembering that his mother, Noimman, was a scientist who knew and practiced things far beyond any mortal's knowledge, he chuckled ominously. He then turned to NTG Rarity and FG Discord and gave them a serious glare that showed not spirals in his eyes, but balls of light glowing as light and dark energy was leaking out of his eyes.

"YOU GUYS BETTER GET READY." Nero said to them confidently, his voice changing as he channeled the soul of Spira living within him. "BECAUSE I NO LONGER FIGHT AS A DEMON...BUT AS A TRUE GOD!"

The Ending of King Nero's Story.

Finally is the story that unites all...


	21. Chapter 21

Episode 21: Unity is Endless

This is what the true god who spoke to Spira continues to say…

 _We all must go down to rise up_

 _Know this, for Starcatch is a trick tower_

 _It warps and reverses all_

 _From top to bottom, you will reach the top_

 _Just as the spiriting begins where there is nothing_

 _And nothing ends before the spiriting_

 _That is where the false god, The Reborn One's true form is_

 _Fear him not, for he is only a child at heart_

 _Veiled in two great evils that make him a monster_

 _The Eternal Three that preceded The Eternal Three_

 _It keeps going back…_

 _The Eternal Three that will succeed The Eternal Three_

 _How will it keep going forward?_

 _Once you defeat your adversaries and understand them_

 _You will be able to answer this question that they can not_

 _For you believe in what always was and always will be_

The true god made this clear to every hero who had braved the trials of the Spiriting project, proving themselves to be on the level of the other gods. Since King Nero had made his declaration of war on Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord, they acknowledged the gauntlet he threw by bringing all the other heroes to his world. When Myra Michaels, Adrian Bruce, and all of their allies had arrived, they looked up at the tip of Starcatch coming out of the vortex in the sky and were fascinated.

"What is this…?" they asked in astonishment.

"This is where all of your journeys shall finally come to a climatic end…" NTG Rarity happily explained to them in response.

"...or will it actually be a climatic beginning, ho ho?" FG Discord teased.

NTG Rarity then clopped her hooves together and FG Discord snapped his fingers, causing the vortex to swirl faster than it ever had before, pulling everyone on top of the roof inside. After getting caught in the vortex, the heroes were eventually dragged towards the edge of Starcatch, where instead of colliding with it, they vanished with a flash of light, being teleported inside…

 _Though none of the heroes realized it then, the trick that both the true god and Rarity and Discord were hinting at was that they would be starting at both the end and beginning…_

 _Our first hero to undergo their trial is the one who made their appearance before their own story, the one whose story comes before this one, and the one who was in the story before that. And although she is the first, the last shall be first and the first shall be last…_

The one talked about here was none other than Myra Michaels, who appeared in front of a familiar building in the world of what appeared to be Equestria. Examining her environment, she saw no one else around. Looking at herself, she realized she was in the form of Maud Pie once more.

"Back to this again…" she thought solemnly. "Strange though...the last thing I remembered actually doing was talking to Nero. Then after that, I felt myself suddenly fall into a deep sleep where I was reliving my past memories...only it wasn't me...I felt like three other entities were trying to control me…"

 _Hee hee hee…_

Myra Michaels/Maud Pie overheard a demonic laugh that sounded like Pinkie Pie's coming from the building behind her...which turned out to be Sugarcube Corner, the place where it all began…

 _...and where it all ended for The Reborn One…_

*CRACKLE* *BOOM*

Myra jumped back to avoid a bolt of lightning that abruptly came from above.

"What the hell?" she said in surprise as she saw a dark cloud hovering above the entrance of Sugarcube Corner. As the cloud began to loom closer to her, she quickly jumped forward and rolled under it to avoid another lightning bolt. With the cloud then trying to follow her from behind, she fled into Sugarcube Corner and barred the door shut behind her, entering a place that was pitch-black. Immediately, the cloud stopped shooting lightning, garnering Myra's interest. She leaned her head closer to the door to listen, not noticing the silhouette of a pegasus pony menacingly grinning with a rope in hoof to her side. And unlike before, Myra didn't notice a presence in her shadow...

"It's not trying to destroy the door…" Myra remarked upon hearing the cloud become silent. "So it's not meant to be an enemy, but an obstacle meant to keep me inside. However, that only makes things even more confusing. I already have no intent on running away from whatever evil I must face here, and even if I did, I could just outrun the cloud and move to another location. It couldn't just be for show…"

 _I'll give you a spoiler, it's part of the puzzle._

This time, it was the voice of Applejack that Myra heard as she pulled out her sword to prepare for battle.

"I'm not at all interested in your silly riddles." Myra made a rejoinder. "I'm fine with the occasional brain teaser, but I get much more engaged in good action."

 _So you're like me...knowing that is going to make spoiling you with this treat all the more fun…_

Myra heard the voice of Rainbow Dash echo those words, and with that, Myra felt two forelegs rubbing against her shoulders…

*WHOOSH*

Myra immediately reached for her tranquilizer gun and turned around to shoot whatever figure was creeping up behind her, but the figure, turning out to be Rainbow Dash, hovering above with a noose in hooves, flew up to dodge. Rainbow then swooped in towards Myra at light speed, successfully slipping the noose around the neck. Myra instantly tried cutting the rope that held the knot...only to find that the noose wasn't made of ordinary rope...but extremely sticky, pink bubblegum that had both a very viscous liquid and a powerful, dark aura flowing through it...

"Booya!" Rainbow exclaimed happily. "If only you had countered me with your sword, then you would've had a chance. But you didn't want to risk killing me only to find out I was actually redeemable, did you? Even though I'm obviously _way_ more awesome than just redeemable..."

"How would it be "good action" if I just killed you then and there?" Myra returned the taunt. "I told you that I was fine with the occasional brain teaser, and finding out how to get out of traps like this are the kinds of puzzles I'm actually good at…"

"Well I'll be," interjected Applejack, appearing out of the shadows alongside Pinkie Pie, "this lass has got herself a smarter mouth than a parrot."

"I guess we can call it a...parrot trap now, hee hee hee!" Pinkie made a joke that had Applejack and Rainbow Dash rolling their eyes.

"Feh." Myra retorted, unamused for different reasons. "You can't fool me. I sense your demonic auras. You may look like them and be trying to talk like them, but you'll never be them."

"Oh, for sure…" Rainbow replied evilly. "Ever since we became gods, we've been quite proud of our identities...eternal servants of The Risen One…"

"Yeah, we'll give it to you straight." Applejack said sincerely. "We love being evil in the form of something meant to represent good…"

"Going over to the dark side is so much fun!" Pinkie jubilantly exclaimed. "They have cake! I'm cake! Can you believe it?"

Something dawned on Myra as their words triggered memories...

"Hold on…" Myra said to herself as she started having flashbacks to the Awakening project. "I remember you guys now. You're not ordinary demons...you were amongst the heroes I was assigned to guide to the Immortal World. So you ended up being corrupted by Rarity and Discord after all, huh?"

"We prefer the term, "shown the truth"." Rainbow retorted as Applejack magically made a bottle of apple cider appear in her right hoof, surprising Myra. "And although Rarity and Discord were the ones who bestowed our god powers upon us, they were not the ones who showed us what led to us to be here as we are now."

"So you're demon gods now…" Myra realized as Applejack drank some of the cider and gave a satisfied belch. "What is your goal?"

"Our goal is to defeat you and prove our strength to The Reborn One…" Applejack answered, and snickering as she swigged her half-finished apple cider, tossed the bottle on the part of the floor where Myra was hanging over, breaking the bottle and soaking the floor wet. "So that we can replace the Trinity…"

"We should be the only ones to bear the Trinity's cross…" Pinkie Pie remarked, giggling sinisterly as she watched the soaked part of the floor begin to corrode. "...while you only have to bear the suffering of a death befitting a scoundrel…"

"?!" Myra felt the floor beneath her breaking, and in response, began struggling to get the noose off her neck more desperately, but to no avail. She fell through the hole that eventually opened up in the floor with the noose around her neck and into the basement. From above, she heard the three demon gods taunting her with…

"SAY HI TO OUR OLD FRIENDS FOR US!"

Scanning the new environment, Myra quickly saw what they were referring to. Surrounding her, to her surprise and confusion, were the bodies of Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy, hanging from the ceiling of the basement with ordinary ropes around their necks…

"What…?" Myra asked herself as she felt an unpleasant aura coming from their corpses. "Is this world…"

Myra started thinking…

"I thought for sure this was the same world I was in earlier, only modified to test me. If that was true, then these corpses would definitely be fake, creations of mere computer data from Starcatch. But I don't sense that to be the case. These dead bodies feel like they've been abandoned by spirits who held strong grudges. If they're clones made from humans, they must be from another world...so is this not the world of the Spiriting? I have to get out of here and wring the answers out of those creeps before this rope wrings the life out of me!"

Myra gripped the rope as hard as she could. Her hands stuck to it, leaving her unable to climb up the rope, but she didn't care. She pulled her body up and pressed herself against the rope, purposefully getting herself wrapped in the gum so that she couldn't fall and be hung.

"Guess you weren't lying…" the trio of demon gods remarked as they watched Myra's attempt to pull herself out of the predicament she was in. "You do have a quick wit for getting out of traps...too bad for you, there's much more to this trap than just that...just like how multiple layers make better gum, multiple layers make better traps!"

The three then stamped their hooves on the ground and transformed into their respective god forms. Applejack became a soldier in a suit of gold armor, bearing a star-shaped shield with the emblem of an eye on it, Rainbow Dash became a merchant dressed in a green vest that said, "PEACE COMES", on it and held a variety of weapons wrapped in paper used to write peace treaties on, and Pinkie Pie became a magician dressed in a red hat and a blue cape with bottles and beakers under it, and holding a small cauldron of green liquid in hoof. They had become the God of Magic, the God of Peace, and the God of Science respectively.

"Since you couldn't cut that rope earlier…" the God of Magic, Applejack, jeered as she charged up an energy blast in her shield. "...allow me to help you now…"

Applejack fired the energy blast at the rope of gum, severing it, and causing Myra to fall to the basement floor, now stuck to it along with the gum. Now struggling to get free of the gum, Myra's attention was caught by something she couldn't see earlier...barrels. Large barrels of apple cider…

"They must have known from the start they couldn't kill me with such a traditional trick…" Myra thought. "No, I'll even go so far to say that they were betting on the possibility of me being immortal, or at least close to immortal...so they set up a trap that could theoretically entomb me here forever…"

Myra's hunch was soon shown not to be a pretense, as the three demon gods had planned this in advance, displayed by a beeping sound from bombs Rainbow had planted on the back of the barrels. Chortling as she and the other demon gods now stood outside of Sugarcube Corner, having left through the back entrance, Rainbow pulled out a scroll from her vest that transformed into a switch for detonating the bombs…

*BAM* *SPLURGE* *GLUG*

Loud noises of apple cider-filled barrels exploding and flooding the basement with sticky fluid were heard from the building, and the trio of demon gods gave a loud, wicked laugh of triumph in response.

"Of course…" Myra continued thinking. "A demon god would know that my demonic powers would protect me from being killed by strangulation and a few bomb blasts...but if I get stuck in something that's inescapable in theory…"

Myra started grasping the gravity of the situation even better after she noticed that as the cider from the barrels started rising over her head, the gum she was stuck in started expanding, absorbing the liquid. Before she knew it, the gum was over her face, completely wrapped around her body. Even with her demon powers, Myra felt a strain in her lungs from the pressure and inability to breathe as the cider kept rising and the gum kept growing larger…

"It seems hopeless…" Myra remarked at the situation in thought. "...I never thought that I'd ever be caught in a trap this diabolical...so why am I so calm?"

Myra soon got an answer from the true god, whispering this in her mind…

 _Because in the past, you escaped a trap far more deadly than this. A trap worse than death itself. A trap that's even worse than being trapped forever in a place you want to get out of. I'm sure you can remember now what that trap is…_

"Yeah…" Myra replied, realizing now why she felt the way she did. "It's the trap of not knowing the truth. You're only truly trapped if you live your life believing lies…"

Now able to think more clearly, Myra realized a way she could use what was binding her to her advantage. Since she couldn't move, it was much easier for her to allow aura to flow through her as she began to meditate, allowing the souls inside of her to provide her with more power.

"It may still be difficult to breathe…" Myra thought. "...but upon reaching the peak of meditation, I will no longer even feel the pressure against my lungs or any part of my body...only my soul...my true self, I will take the form of…"

It wasn't long after Myra said that to herself that she was able to transform. A strong aura of both light and darkness began to pour out of her body as she sprouted both the wings of a demon and the wings of an angel out of her back, just like she had done after she protected her village from Nick's wrath. Reminded of the fire she absorbed back then, she thought to herself…

"Even if it's a magical fire that can even burn underwater, I don't know how much alcohol is in this cider...so I guess I'm choosing darkness over fire here…"

However, before Myra could attempt breaking out of the gum with dark energy blasts from her hooves, she heard a familiar voice say something that led her to stop…

"I wouldn't do that if I were you...unless you want to be stuck in hell forever. You may want to reconsider wanting that knowing that I wouldn't be able to keep you company there."

Recognizing the voice, Myra asked…

"...Nero? How did you get here? How come I didn't sense you?"

"Because I'm not the Nero you knew from before." he replied, referencing to how Spira was now inside of him. "As for how I got here, I've actually been here the whole time. I was following you inside your shadow. I would've helped you out earlier, but I feel you've been handling yourself pretty well up until now, especially considering that you're the only hero who doesn't know how to combine Yin and Yang. Putting more dark energy into that gum would've been counterproductive, since there's already dark energy in it. All that would've happened is that it would've expanded, trapping you even more. To break out of it, you need to fill it with light energy, creating an explosion with the dark energy inside the gum, blowing it up."

Myra followed Nero's advice and used light energy blasts from her hooves against the gum instead, causing it to explode and set her free.

"Interesting…" Myra replied, looking at her hooves, marveling at this power. "I was the first hero to appear, yet I'm the last to learn this crucial ability…"

"So you're already catching on to the trick of this tower, nice work." an impressed Nero commended. "However, just like the trap you're in right now, there's multiple layers to it. One traditional trick isn't enough. The puzzle of the tower is a _combination_ of tricks…"

"So that's what's going on…" Myra said as she found the answer to the next part of the puzzle. "That's why this world bears great similarities to both the world of the Spiriting and the world that started the whole thing…so naturally, the next world will be..."

Myra then took a moment to commune with the souls inside of her…

"Please forgive me…" she asked of them. "Though I will never break my vow not to kill, I must break a vow of our pride to help our comrades…"

The vow that Myra was forced to break...was allowing Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord to speak to her in her mind once more for a deal…

Meanwhile, the trio of demon gods were outside Sugarcube Corner, celebrating their victory with bottles of apple cider that they toasted and drank.

"Ha ha ha, drowning someone in apple cider!" Applejack exclaimed with a hearty laugh. "Now that's how you get someone wasted! And that's how you tell a joke, Pinkie!"

"Yeah, no offense, dude." Rainbow interjected. "We appreciate what you do for us, but comedy's something we'd rather you not go gumming up."

"I know how much easier it would be for all of us if I just shut my cake-hole…" Pinkie sarcastically retorted. "...but honestly, would you rather me just be a bore? Or at least give you something that will stick to you?"

 _I take it you've never heard of napalm, mwa ha ha ha ha…_

"?!" Pinkie froze in fear upon hearing Nero snicker inside of her shadow, as Rainbow noticed what he had done. He had mixed his light and dark energy with the liquid in the cauldron to create a volatile substance that was about to explode…

"JOSEPH, GET DOWN!" Rainbow called the Pinkie clone by his real name as she rushed towards her, pushing her aside and grabbing the cauldron. She threw off her vest, scattering all her weapons and using the paper they were wrapped as sheets to cover the cauldron, along with the vest and her own body…

"The magic from the sheets and vest won't be enough to shield them, so here goes nothing…" Rainbow told herself, sacrificing herself without hesitation.

"LEON!" Pinkie and Applejack cried, calling the Rainbow clone by his real name as they saw what he was doing for them. In response, Rainbow simply turned to them, smiling as he said…

"Peace out."

*KABOOM*

Pinkie's cauldron exploded, blowing the vest and papers to smithereens as Pinkie and Applejack jumped and rolled away just in time to avoid getting caught in the explosion. Rainbow was blown back, her body charred from the explosion, and soon splattered with a bubbling pink substance…

"What…" Rainbow said to herself in shock as the substance enveloped her, recognizing it. "This isn't just light and dark energy...they mixed some of the gum we used in here too! Along with...OH MY GOD!"

Rainbow realized in horror that what was also infused in the gum was Myra's fire as her entire body was set ablaze…

"GGGGGRRRRRAAAAAHHHHH!" he hollered in agony as he impulsively dropped to the floor and rolled around, trying to break out of the fiery gum to no avail. The more he rolled around, the more he got stuck to the ground, until he could do nothing but squirm in one place and scream…

This sight was so mortifying to Applejack and Pinkie that they were asphyxiated. They couldn't even react to Myra and Nero sneaking up on them through their shadows and bringing a sword and a blade of dark energy to their necks respectively.

"The jig is up." Myra remarked. "We'll free your friend from the fire in exchange for your surrender."

"...That's fine." Applejack replied solemnly.

"Hold on," interjected Nero, "that's not all. We also want intel. You have to tell us whatever we want to know. Understand?!"

"Sure." Pinkie answered. "Just please let our friend go."

"You...you mean it?!" Nero exclaimed, shocked to be sensing good in the Pinkie clone that was actually Joseph Baker even after everything he had done. "You don't find our conditions unreasonable?! You're not going to try to weasel your way out of this at your "buddy's" expense? What's it to scum like you if he suffers?!"

"Nero, please." Myra pleaded of Nero to calm himself. "I know that they're monsters, but you of all should know that even a demon can have a heart. Besides, they're just puppets."

"Fine, but I'm still going to have my way with this little shit." Nero asserted, looking at Pinkie menacingly. "For fuck's sake, even Spira agrees he deserves to suffer…"

Myra and Nero then held up to what they promised as they raised their free hoof towards the gum Rainbow was suffering inside, and absorbed the fire along with the dark and light energy inside of them, reverting it to ordinary aura. Each of them still had their other hoof occupied at Applejack and Pinkie's throats, however…

"Now then…" they told their hostages. "Tell us who you really are and what you're doing here…"

"Our real names are Daniel Sofhard, Leon Hayst, and Joseph Baker…" they answered. "We're from the Awakening project. We don't have any personal motives, we were just following orders from Rarity, Discord, and the star that brought us to the world of the Spiriting."

"What star?" Nero asked in confusion.

"The star is part of The Eternal Three, along with Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy." they explained. "The true Reborn One is using them to complete the Trinity and make his existence known throughout every part of the universe, regardless of where they are in time and space. And the reason the true Reborn One chose them is because they were the most powerful ones in all of the universe...at the time."

"So the reason for this test is to see if we can replace them…" Myra surmised.

"Yes…" they confirmed Myra's suspicion. "The true Reborn One isn't satisfied with just the Trinity. He wants to create new souls who are even more powerful than Twilight, Fluttershy, and the star...and he wants a more powerful replacement for the Trinity. We thought that if we could defeat you and prove our power to the true Reborn One, he'd replace them with us…"

"So you mean to tell us that all this time, you were just trying to help your friends?!" Nero exclaimed in disbelief. "And you were trying to spare us the burden of being his lackey on top of it?! Why would you do something like that?! I thought you were demons!"

"I've done terrible things, I know!" Pinkie yelled, knowing where Nero's anger was coming from. "But please, believe us, we just want to make up for the mistake we made!"

"The whole reason the world of the Spiriting was created was because of our mistake!" Applejack chimed in, speaking in a tone of honest regret. "If we just hadn't said that The Risen One was right! If only we had believed in the true god!"

"Wha-what the hell happened during that project?!" Nero demanded to know. "How did you influence something like that?! Weren't Rarity and Discord running the show?!"

"No...The Risen One was." Applejack replied. "And she's gone now. Even the Rarity and Discord we originally worked under are gone now, replaced by even more corrupt counterparts, and it's all our fault."

"I'm so sorry for everything you've had to suffer through." Pinkie honestly apologized. "We only wanted to end your suffering, stop you from being used by ending it all here…"

 _For yourselves, I presume. I hope you did not actually think you were going to end our heroes here..._

Applejack and Pinkie froze in fear upon hearing Ninja Time God Rarity speak those words in their minds.

 _If you believe trapping them here forever is mercy, then allow us to be all the more compassionate towards you despite you no longer being of any use to us…_

Upon hearing Fantasy God Discord say that, Applejack and Pinkie knew they were doomed, and in desperation, cried out to Myra and Nero…

"SOLVE THE PUZZLE OF THIS TOWER AND GET OUT OF HERE! DON'T LET THEM-GYAH!"

 _Before they could say anything else, Applejack melted into a pool of apple cider, and Pinkie became nothing more than liquified cake mixture. Both of them dripped down to the gum that their comrade, Rainbow, had been reduced to nothing more than a pile of jelly inside by the fire, where they were absorbed by the gum. And now, the trio of demon gods, are as one. As immortal gods, they still remain alive and conscious inside of the gum that Myra Michaels has now turned to jelly. By her request, we have transported the jelly from the basement and the jelly the demon gods are now to the Immortal World, providing the next group of heroes to tackle the next challenge of Starcatch with the advantage of an extra clue…_

This is what NTG Rarity and FG Discord wrote in their book as they mused inside of a familiar area…a church filled with clones of Maud Pie…in a world that was intertwined with itself…


	22. Chapter 22

Episode 22: No End to Our Meaning

 _The next group of heroes to be tested will be Adrian Bruce and her comrades. The next step forward towards the future will be with the only heroes who never stepped back into the past, for while Myra and Nero had origin stories, the origin of Adrian and her brother is still veiled in mystery. One very clear door was left open at the end of their tale…_

 _...what is the red pill? Is it the gateway to another reality, or just another fantasy?_

 _...It all matters what's on the inside…_

Adrian, Felix, and the Dark Sky members found themselves standing in front of what appeared to be an amusement park. Unlike the world Myra ended up in, this world was not abandoned, as ponies could be seen inside the carnival enjoying its attractions. Growing accustomed to knowing of the existence of talking ponies, what astonished Adrian and Felix about this sight was not the carnival goers. It was the fact that every attraction from the Ferris Wheel to the bumper cars, to the roller coasters, and even the food stands...were all made of jelly.

"Jelly Rockets…" Adrian said in a puzzled tone of voice as she looked up at the sign. "Makes me wonder if they offer more than just regular rides here…"

"At least you'd get your money's worth…" Felix chimed in, bristling his neck, feeling awkward for saying that.

"Ha ha ha ha ha!" Ghost Rainbow Dash burst out laughing as she floated closer to the two and winked at them. "Trust me, you do get your money's worth here. Especially if you're lucky enough to find free quality entertainment…"

"Dash!" Dumb-bell proclaimed in protest. "You better not be thinking of trying anything funny like last time!"

"Relax," replied G.R.D. in a laidback tone, "I've learned my lesson. No touchies in the bathroom. Save it for where you can get away with it in the haunted hotel…"

"We were at a hotel when you touched me in my sleep!" Dumb-bell exclaimed, as G.R.D. laughed and flew into the park. "I knew you hadn't learned anything!"

The other Dark Sky members laughed as Dumb-bell chased G.R.D., while Adrian and Felix gave them a look of confusion.

"So...are you guys...friends?" Adrian asked. "Are any of you...more than friends?"

"..." Score silently answered their question by telling them about the magic of friendship, as well as the magic of having more than just friendship.

"Truly the answer to all of life's problems." Hoops commented, genuinely marveled.

"But what's Twilight Sparkle's horn for?" Derpy Hooves asked with curiosity.

Adrian and Felix just shrugged their shoulders, knowing that they weren't going to fully understand these characters overnight, especially considering how different their background was from theirs.

"But to be fair, we did just get out of high school…" Felix remarked in thought.

"So I guess we're going inside this place to investigate…" Adrian said in thought as the other Dark Sky members went in ahead of them. "Guess I don't know what to expect, other than this carnival not making us feel at home dicking around inside of it…"

Adrian was right to expect what she did, for the obvious reason as well as another unintended reason she didn't know of. No one knew at the time, but as part of the trick of Starcatch, this Jelly Rockets was not the same place where there were greater concerns than dicks being touched…

"FORESHADOWING!" Crazy Celes exclaimed loudly, revealing that she was at the park, riding on the Ferris Wheel.

"Huh?" Felix responded, hearing and recognizing Celes' voice, and looked to see her in the distance. "Hey, is that…"

"Oh no!" Celes reacted to noticing that Felix noticed her. "The foreshadowing was too obvious!"

Adrian and Felix made their way into the park and approached the Ferris Wheel.

"What are you doing here?" Adrian interrogated Celes.

"I'm on vacation!" Celes exclaimed as the wheel began to turn. "After I got fired from working at that school, I thought it was best for me give my gears a rest after such a hard ride!"

"Oh, don't even bother trying to cover your ass…" Adrian replied in bemusement. "We know about you being a demon god, so fess up about what you're actually planning before we beat it out of you."

"Why would I have to cover my ass when this seat does it well enough?!" Celes yelled as the Ferris Wheel reached the top and stopped. "And if you want to ride my ass that badly, you're going to have to wait till the ride's finished!"

"Wrong." Adrian said bluntly, wearing a smirk. "If I want to ride your ass that badly…"

Adrian then allowed light and dark aura to emit from her body, giving her the strength to leap up towards the top of the Ferris Wheel and land on the seat Celes was riding in.

"...I'm going to have to jump on top and take initiative." she finished.

The other passengers on the Ferris Wheel were shocked and gasped, as other carnival goers from below were looking up, having seen Adrian's dramatic leap.

"Who is that woman?" one of them asked as the Dark Sky members overheard. "Where did an ordinary human being get that kind of power?"

"Ordinary human being?" Dumb-bell responded, confused. "Have you forgotten Myra Michaels and Edward Miles? They were just ordinary human beings too before they got their powers."

"Well technically, Myra is half-demon, but to be fair, she only became infused with a demon after she was born an ordinary human…" Hoops interjected, being meticulous about details to the others' disgruntlement.

"Who the hell are those people?" another carnival goer asked, surprising the Dark Sky members.

"Uh...did you guys get hit with a Men in Black memory eraser while we were away?" G.R.D. half-jokingly asked. "How can you not at least remember Myra? She helped build this amusement park with Rarity and Discord by bringing them the jelly they needed!"

"Though the name still doesn't ring a bell…" another park attendee answered. "I do recall seeing another mysterious and powerful woman here earlier, who cast a creepy shadow behind her that looked like it was alive. Somehow, she was able to transport a large blob of jelly here all by herself and drop it off near where the restrooms are. After that, she went towards the haunted hotel."

This bit of information caused something to click in the Dark Sky members' heads.

"..." Score silently relayed to the others his theory of what was really going on.

"I agree…" Derpy concurred. "Something's fishy here and it ain't making me jelly!"

"I can't say I'm stunned or shocked though…" Hoops chimed in. "Not only were we warned about this being a tower of tricks, we've had firsthand experience inside of Starcatch. You know how crazy shit can get in here, like what happened with Twilight and her kids."

"Twilight and her kids…" Dumb-bell mused to himself, thinking about Adrian and Felix and coming to a realization. "If those two were able to defeat one of Twilight's kids, that's not just another reason to believe there's more to them than meets the eye...it's proof that both Fluttershy and Twilight had some kind of a plan for them…"

Meanwhile, on top of the Ferris Wheel, Adrian had proceeded to interrogate Celes.

"End of the line, whackjob." Adrian told her bluntly as she brought her hands together and cracked her knuckles. "Tell us what you're hiding before I get physical with you."

"Ooh la la!" Celes exclaimed, deliberately misconstruing what she said. "I'd love a good whacking at the end of my line!"

"Well, too bad." Adrian taunted as she put on her knuckle dusters. "Because it's going to be more of a pummeling against your face, not your fanny. This is your last warning to fess up before you get hurt..."

"Oh please, have mercy!" Celes cried, flinching and covering her face with her arms. "I swear, I can't remember where I buried the body!"

"Guess we're doing this the hard way then…" Adrian said with a sigh as she prepared to throw a right hook at Celes' face, only for Celes to stop the blow by catching it with her left hand despite not even looking at it, to Adrian's astonishment.

"But now that you mention it," interjected a suddenly composed Celes as she looked the other way, "I do recall disposing of a very nasty woman's remains not too long ago."

"You're still making fun of me?!" Adrian yelled angrily, thinking Celes was referring to her. "At least look at me if you're going to fight back!"

Frustrated at Celes pretending to ignore her, Adrian lifted Celes up with the hand she had caught and attempted to smash her against the safety bar, forgetting common sense in a fit of rage…

*WAPING*

Not only did the safety bar break off and fall, but the seat was sent spinning from the force of the impact, causing both Celes and Adrian to fall. Adrian quickly gripped a bar extending from the inner wheel of the Ferris Wheel as Celes grabbed onto her leg. Watching everything that was going on, Felix was alarmed.

"ADRIAN!" he yelled in a panicked tone of voice. "I'M GOING TO GET HELP! DON'T DO ANYTHING ELSE ON YOUR OWN BEFORE I GET BACK!"

"Rrrggghhh…" Adrian grumbled as she watched her brother take off in search of the Dark Sky members. "I can't believe I'm going to have to get help to take care of you…"

"Come on," replied Celes nonchalantly, in spite of the position she was in, "it could be worse. Your brother could've just left you here hanging! Hee hee hee hee hee!"

"Just shut the fuck up!" Adrian shouted. "What is your problem?! What do you have to gain by meddling with us?!"

"Look who's calling the kettle black even though most kettles are actually gray!" Celes exclaimed, attempting to point out Adrian's hypocrisy. "You attacked me despite me doing nothing to harm you! And you're supposed to be a hero?!"

"When did I ever say I was a hero?!" Adrian retorted. "If you want to play that game with me, fine, I'm an asshole and you're a bigger asshole! Black and gray morality! What does it matter though?! What right do you have to throw that in my face when you're one of the biggest living proofs that you don't get anywhere in this world by being nice?!"

"Are you even being serious?!" Celes yelled. "It's a fact that you're a hero! You fight evil for good! That makes you a tool to be used by Marvel and DC! But more importantly, it makes you someone who has to act as a good role model! Didn't your parents ever teach you that?!"

Adrian didn't respond with an angry or incisive remark, but instead, looked at Celes despondently for a while before she finally told her in a sad tone of voice…

"Now that I look back on it, I don't really know what my parents taught me...or my brother…"

Celes also didn't respond by yelling, giving Adrian an emotionless stare for a while before she did something that Adrian would never have expected her to do...she pulled two purple pills out of her jacket pocket and handed them to Adrian.

"You and your brother both need to take one of these then." Celes solemnly told her.

"How do I know they're not poison?" Adrian asked suspiciously. "Why should I trust you?"

"Because I'm a bad parent myself…" Celes revealed. "And I know how much it hurts a child to grow up not knowing who they are and what to believe…"

Despite still feeling unsure, Adrian accepted the pills and took them in her hand. And with that, Celes let go of Adrian's leg. She began falling towards the ground looking like she was about to hit it, until suddenly, a mysterious force started dragging her up, and she began rising towards the sky. The ponies on the Ferris Wheel were more speechless than ever as they watched. Even Adrian wondered what was going on.

"Is it Yata?" she pondered. "Is he in this world too?"

"No…" Celes abruptly said. "I know what you're thinking, this is not the work of Yata. This is the work of my son, who exists in both the Immortal World and in the world of transcending…"

 _Sky…_

This was the last word Celes spoke before she vanished into the sky, leaving Adrian to look at the pills she was given and figure out for herself what this all meant. Soon after, Felix, riding on Hoops' back, was coming towards her along with the other Dark Sky members, ready to help her down safely. Looking at them, Adrian thought to herself…

"I've never believed in destiny...but something tells me there's a divine purpose for Felix and I meeting these guys and coming to this world. I can't try ignoring this anymore like I did back when Akame was mentoring us. I need to start trying to actually understand things outside my world...and I'll start by working with these dudes who have seen more of the universe about what's beyond the sky…"

Score and Derpy grabbed Adrian and gently brought her down to the ground as the other Dark Sky members also descended.

"Are you feeling okay?" Dumb-bell asked in concern.

"For sure…" Adrian replied as she looked at the pills in her hand again. "You don't have to be concerned for me."

"Oh, but we do." Felix chimed in, frustrated about how Adrian had tried to handle things with Celes so recklessly. "I'm concerned for how rash you've become. If you had just controlled your temper, you wouldn't have been in that mess. Imagine if you had tried to fight Noimman with that same lack of consideration. We would be dead!"

"Yeah, you have every right to be pissed at me." Adrian said sincerely, surprising Felix and the others. "Just admitting I was in the wrong though isn't going to change anything...but I did get something from that maniac that might help us all change something for the better…"

Adrian was about to hold out the pills to them before Dumb-bell stopped her hand.

"Before you do anything else though," he intervened, "I think we should continue this conversation somewhere private…"

Adrian realized what he meant as she looked around and saw all the spectators giving them weird looks.

"Agreed…" she concurred. "Where should we go?"

"I hate to say it…" Dumb-bell answered. "But I think the haunted hotel is our best bet...Dash?"

"You got it!" G.R.D. exclaimed happily. "Take us to the chamber of love from the rested, Maud!"

After G.R.D. yelled that in her mind to be heard telepathically, they disappeared into mist and reappeared elsewhere inside of the haunted hotel. They were now with Myra Michaels, still in the form of Maud Pie, and Nero in a hotel room. Maud had teleported them there using a Body Mind Soul summoning.

"Hold on, this is an actual hotel?" Adrian asked. "As in, a place where people check in and lie down to sleep for the night?"

"That's how it's been since I've been around, heh." G.R.D. answered.

"I thought it would be like a haunted house, just a short ride." Felix interjected.

"Well, _occasionally_ , the ride gets cut kind of short…" G.R.D. explained, blushing.

"Ahem." Myra intervened. "Don't ignore the elephants in the room."

"Who are you guys?" Adrian asked Myra and Nero.

"We're the other "heroes" those shitbags, Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord, brought into the Spiriting project to foster into worthless pawns." Nero answered with the most cynical explanation possible, frustrated with recent events. "Because of them, I lost my sister...and now, they're trying to turn us into their boss, The Reborn One's replacement pets!"

"We need you kids to join us." Myra told them. "It's not just that we can't beat Rarity and Discord and The Reborn One without your help. Without us uniting together, there's no way we can conquer the challenge of this tower. This place is one big puzzle, and even if we know the answer to the puzzle, it makes no difference if we can't apply the answer."

"That's something I totally understand." Adrian replied, still thinking about the realization she had when she was with Celes. "But before Felix and I can join you, there's something we have to do, or else we'll just slow you down…"

It was then that Adrian showed the others the purple pills she had acquired.

"Hmm?" Nero went as he recognized what the pills contained.

"Celes gave these to me, telling Felix and I to take them before she took off." Adrian explained. "I hate to have to trust her, but these pills are our only lead so far to finding out more about this world...and ourselves…"

"Especially after what just happened," said Felix in an assertive tone, skeptical and still unhappy about Adrian's brash behavior from earlier, "there is no way I am taking one of those pills without some kind of proof that they're safe."

"I can prove that they're safe." Nero chimed in. "Noimman created pills like that back in her laboratory and she had Yata and I take a few. They're not toxic, not in the traditional sense at least. Their purpose is to speed up the process of learning how to mix Yin and Yang by making one more aware of their inner evil, what the darkness in their soul comes from…"

"Really?" Adrian and Felix replied as they looked at him and saw that his eyes were now emitting a purple haze. When they looked closer at the pills, they saw that same haze glowing...

"Are these the eyes of a liar?" Nero brashly joked about how the two would still be forced to take a leap of faith. Even Felix, however, became convinced that taking these pills was the only way for him and his sister to find out about what it was in the past that was preventing them from moving forward in the future.

"Like it would've been the kind of poison I could detect anyways…" Felix thought to himself, remembering what happened with Akame giving him and Adrian drinks filled with supernatural energy he couldn't identify. "No matter what, it's going to be a thing of trust. I don't mind that though, because I trust in Adrian. Everyone who's helped and is still helping us get by has no motive to hurt us with a lie. Only the truth can help all of us succeed…"

"And just so you know," interjected Myra reassuringly, "no matter what happens, we all have your backs…because we're in this together as a team…"

As everyone else nodded in agreement, Adrian and Felix finally had all the confidence they needed to take this shot in the dark. They each swallowed one of the pills, causing their bodies to have an uncanny reaction. They didn't physically feel anything course throughout their bodies besides an awkward buzz, but mentally, they started becoming more alert and aware. At first, it didn't seem like these pills were any different than ordinary drugs...until they realized what was causing the vibration inside of them. Unlike the drinks Akame had given them, which had merely made them subconsciously aware of the dark power inside of them, these pills allowed them to see and recognize the dark aura exuding from their bodies. It flowed out not just from their heads to their feet...but from their eyes too. Their eyes emitted a purple haze, just like Nero's, and he took note...along with both of the spirits that were inside of him…

"Yes...YES!" Noimman's ghost cried victoriously from inside her son. "This is what I've been waiting for!"

"No!" Spira's soul exclaimed in anguish. "I can't hold her in!"

Since Spira's spirit had merged with Nero, she had been keeping Noimman's spirit at bay, but nothing could keep Noimman under control upon watching such dark power emerge from the ones who killed her.

"EEE HEH HEH HEH HEE!" her ghost let out a terrifyingly wicked laugh as it emerged from Nero. "FINALLY! I KNEW YOU TWO COULDN'T RESIST THE PATH OF DARKNESS, JUST LIKE MY SON! AND NOW, I FINALLY HAVE THE PERFECT OPPORTUNITY TO SHOW YOU THE WORLD OF HELL!"

"Not if we have something to-" the Dark Sky members were about to say something and step in before Myra stopped them, holding out her sword in front of them.

"No." she told them. "This was their challenge they set for themselves. If we rescue them from this situation now, we'll only hurt them in the long run."

"Not like we could help them right now anyways." Nero added. "What we need to do is wait for her to slip up after getting too cocky, then kick her when she's down before she has a chance to get back up…"

"DELUSIONAL FOOLS!" Noimman mocked them. "THIS IS MY BIG BREAK! YOU COULDN'T RUIN IT IN YOUR DREAMS! NOTHING CAN STOP ME NOW!"

Nero just chuckled as Noimman began to manipulate the dark energy surrounding Adrian and Felix, wrapping it around all of them.

"Now that you're in my world, I can finally show you two why I was always so set on you…" Noimman spoke to the two in an ominous tone as they could only see pitch-black darkness. "You see, my father who created me from Twilight Sparkle's inner evil is one of The Eternal Three, along with Fluttershy and Twilight herself, the ones my son believes to be, "The Reborn One's pets". The reason Noava was able to control me as a puppet when you fought me is because I am a weapon meant to be used by Twilight and her children...just as you two are weapons meant to be used by me..."

"No, we are not!" Adrian and Felix proclaimed in protest. "We don't care how you manipulated our parents, that doesn't make us your tools!"

"Oh, but I'm afraid how I manipulated your parents does matter." Noimman retorted deviously. "For the story of your origin shows how you've been products of the darkness from the very start!"

It was then that the darkness in front of Adrian and Felix rolled back to show them a vision from the past. In it, they could see their father, Cristo, studying restlessly in his laboratory with Noimman by his side. Cristo was sitting at his desk sighing, slumping back in his chair before Noimman offered to give him a shoulder massage.

"Before you kids were born," said Noimman, narrating over the flashback, "your father was pouring all his time into his research. Spending day after day, looking into chemical studies and engineering, I was there to give him solace when things got too stressful. And believe it or not, I actually enjoyed helping the poor sod. Not just because I was also helping myself, but also because I enjoyed making his wife jealous…"

Krysta was then shown watching Noimman talk to Cristo coyly, leading her to storm off up to her bedroom in anger. Pregnant at the time, she was contemplating doing something to get her husband's attention back…

"Yes…" Noimman continued in a sinister tone of voice. "I knew it was going to drive her to do something crazy eventually. And there was no way I was going to miss the show…"

Noimman then began to insert her dark energy, part of her true form, inside of Cristo, as it could be seen that Krysta was clutching a red pill inside her right fist as she opened the bedroom door with her left hand and shut it behind her. She stayed on her bed all day, waiting for Cristo to come up to the room to turn in, only to get a nasty surprise…

"WHAT THE FUCK?!"

"That's what Cristo yelled when his wife had explained to him what she was going to do…" Noimman recounted. "She told him that she was going to take abortion pills to kill you two in the womb...that's right. Despite your differences in appearance, you two are actually twins. Your father and I gave your mother drugs to promote strong growth of your cells in the womb, drugs that also likely altered your physical structuring. Your mother must have used pills to try and abort you out of irony...but your father wouldn't have it...so you know what he did?"

Krysta actually swallowed the red abortion pill she showed her husband, only for her husband to charge towards her, his right fist exuding Noimman's dark energy…

*POW*

Cristo smacked his wife in the chest as hard as he could, causing her to cough up the red pill.

"..." Adrian and Felix were without words after seeing this.

"Now do you understand?" Noimman boasted evilly as the flashback ended and the darkness returned to its original form. She then stood before them in her "human form", having created herself another body from the darkness, and continued to gloat. "The only reason you kids exist is because of the evil your parents and I have done. You're the result of our vile experiment, the creation of a girl with superhuman strength and the creation of a boy with superhuman mental capacity. To defy me is to defy your existence. I am your god. You owe all to ME! MWA HA HA HA HA!"

"No, we don't." they immediately replied. "Fuck off."

"Like you can just make me go away…" Noimman taunted. "You can spend your whole lives ignoring me if you want, and you'll still be forever haunted-"

"By what?" Adrian interrupted her with a rejoinder. "Do you really think knowing this makes us any more afraid of you? Of course our past is beyond fucked up, but what difference does it make? We can't change our past...it's over now! Forever!"

"Wrong!" Noimman exclaimed. "Time is endless in this world! The past, present, and future are all intertwined! Once you're born from the darkness, you're with the darkness forever!"

"Then why do we have light?" Felix retorted. "All you are is darkness, thus why you cling so strongly to this shit, believing it's a source of strength even though it means nothing. But our strength comes from believing there's a light we can create in our darkness, accepting both the good and the bad so that we can let go of things like this. How can you call yourself our god when you've proven yourself weaker than us?"

"..." Noimman found herself to be the speechless one now, as those words were beyond her understanding.

"NO...NNNNNOOOOO!" she bellowed. "THAT DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE! THERE IS NO LIGHT, THERE IS NO GOOD! PEOPLE ARE JUST EVIL! EVERYTHING IS EVIL! MY CREATORS ARE EVILIT'SALLONLYEVIL-"

While Noimman was breaking down, Nero snuck up behind her and clamped his mouth down on her head, biting her neck.

"Heh heh." he thought as Noimman flailed around. "I don't _need_ to eat souls anymore, but I still have the power to consume them. Not that you're worth it…"

Myra also came from behind to stab Noimman in the back and through her chest with her sword.

"I could've pierced your wicked soul with my blade any time I wanted…" Myra told Noimman with a smug grin on her face. "...but I knew those two would never fall to the likes of you…"

It was then that something came from behind Adrian and Felix. It was the combined form of the Dark Sky members, the holy dragon…

"So this is what we have in common…" the holy dragon remarked. "We're spawn of the darkness that believe in the light…"

The holy dragon then placed a claw around each of the two, filling them with their light energy. Adrian and Felix could now use Yin and Yang on Myra and Nero's level…

"Well Noimman…" Adrian and Felix said to her, looking at the pitiful state she was in. "It looks like you're the one who owes their existence to us, not the other way round. For what you've done, the only place you deserve to exist in…"

Nero then deliberately let Noimman free of the clutches of his jaws so she could see her doom. Noimman froze, knowing it was over for her as Adrian started preparing a punch, her right fist filled with light and dark energy, and Felix readied a potion filled with black fluid and mixed with light and light and dark energy to create something explosive…

*SHWOOM*

Myra pulled her blade out of Noimman's back, sending Noimman flying towards the two from the force of her blade's magical energy. Felix stuffed the potion inside of her wound from the sword and Adrian gave her an uppercut, sending her flying upwards. The energy from Adrian's fist made Felix's explosive mixture even more potent, and as it was about to explode, Adrian and Felix finished their sentence with…

"...is yourself. The darkness that you are."

"IT'S IMPOSSIBLE!" Noimman screamed. "HOW CAN SOMETHING THAT COMES FROM EVIL WANT TO BE GOOD?! DID MY SON ACTUALLY CHANGE?! COULD I HAVE ACTUALLY CHANGED?! WERE MY CREATORS ACTUALLY-"

Noimman was interrupted by the bomb inside of her going off, spreading highly corrosive acid all throughout the inside of her body. In almost an instant, she melted into nothing more than a mass of black goo that spilled on the ground and seeped into the darkness. Noimman's soul was bound by the black blob as it vanished into the dark, but she had no intent on escaping. All she wanted now was a long time to think…

"I thought that since the moment I was created, I was doomed to suffer forever, and I wanted my creations to suffer that same fate. But now they choose not to suffer, so where does that leave me? What about my creators? What will they do? Could I…"

Before long, the darkness surrounding the heroes faded away, and everyone was happy in congratulating Adrian and Felix for a job well done. Oddly enough, however, Adrian and Felix were the least excited amongst the heroes.

"Hold on guys," said Adrian, "we can't celebrate just yet. Not only do we still have to defeat the ones who put Noimman up to this, we have unresolved business in this world."

"You mentioned something about this place being a puzzle, right?" Felix reminded Myra, gesturing to her.

"Yeah, we already talked to her about the "mysterious and powerful woman casting a creepy shadow leaving jelly outside of the restrooms"..." the Dark Sky members intervened, chuckling as they felt weird quoting what the park goer told them.

"Yes, that was us." Myra smiled as she referred to herself and Nero. "We wanted to leave you guys a clue from the world we explored, and now that we're all here, I don't see the reason on holding off on this anymore…"

Myra then did a Body Mind Soul summoning to teleport all of them outside of the restrooms where the jelly was. When Adrian and Felix saw the blob of gum inside the jelly, they asked…

"What is that?"

"That's what the enemies we fought in the world Nero and I were in ended up as…" Myra explained.

"When we defeated Noimman, she was trapped the same way…" Adrian and Felix recognized the striking similarity. "And before we beat her, she showed us a flashback where we were in the womb…"

"!" the Dark Sky members got it. "That's it! We know where we actually are now! We're in the world of the Transcending project!"

"Huh?" the others went.

"This is the Awakening world mixed with the Transcending world!" they exclaimed.

"Just like the world we were just in was the Spiriting world mixed with the world of the original Dark Sky…" Myra and Nero interjected. "Now it's all coming together…"

 _It was then that the heroes finally discovered where the crazy gods were hiding… but will they be able to handle the craziness we've been hiding?_

Ninja Time God Rarity said those words as Fantasy God Discord continued writing the story in the church of Maud Pies.

 _After all, we're a whole different game from Noimman. We aren't just insane, we are insanity intertwined with itself. An endless spiral swirling forever from both beginning to end and end to beginning...that is our nature…_


	23. Chapter 23

Episode 23: Fantastic Reality of True Imagination

 _It is what it is…_

 _We've taken everyone out for a ride, we promise it won't be much longer_

 _Our silly disguise, we wore so you could be stronger_

 _No one else knows but you_

 _No one but you and us two_

 _Only through our defeat will the truth spread_

 _We can only do it if one of us is reborn and the other is dead_

 _I will rise as I have risen…_

These were the last words Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord wrote in their book before they closed it up. FG Discord had the book he was writing in vanish with magic and be replaced by a new one.

"How bittersweet it is that we are both done with a life of playing tricks on others." NTG Rarity commented. "If we are ever to start a new journey, however, we will have to start from the beginning."

"Good thing that neither of us fear the end then." FG Discord replied. "I'd love nothing more to start over in a world where our insanity will be called normalcy. I've risen once...I'm not afraid to rise again…"

...

"...What do they mean by this?"

The heroes were asking this inevitable question as the true god had told them everything that Rarity and Discord had said.

 _All they mean to say is what they have said. They are tired of creating insanity for a world that will never understand them. They want to start making it again in a world that will know what they mean without having to ask a force from beyond. Stay on your guard, however. They fully plan to go out in a blaze of glory._

"What do they plan to do to us?" the heroes replied.

 _They plan to have you intertwined with their world…a world that is already intertwined with itself._

"Intertwined with itself?" they responded. "How does that work?"

 _You solved the riddle of Starcatch, did you not? Surely, you can surmise by yourselves what the purpose of it mixing the worlds with each other like it has, can you?_

"Yeah, we know what the trick to it is…" they answered, ready to explain…

"This tower is an endless loop. The universe of Fluttershy's Dark Sky has five worlds, and this tower is taking us through each world in sequence, from either the first to the last or the last to the first...or so it would seem. We're not just starting from World 1 and making our way up to World 5...we're also starting from World 5 and making our way down to World 1! The tower mixed the worlds with each other to make us believe we were going through every world in either ascending order or descending order when we were actually going through both at the same time! So the real order isn't 1,2,3,4,5 or 5,4,3,2,1...it's 1-5,2-4,3!"

 _Good work. However, that is not where the puzzle ends. That's only the first part of the solution. If the puzzle ended there, you wouldn't have the real location of Rarity and Discord's secret hiding place. To find them, you can not think normal...you have to think crazy…_

"Wait, are you implying…" they replied as they realized what they had overlooked as a silly thought. "...that the real order is 1-5, 2-4, 3-3, 4-2, 5-1?! How can there be two 3's?! And why would the universe repeat itself again?!"

 _That is what they mean when they say that their world is intertwined with itself. And the universe is repeating itself because that's what it means for it to be in an endless loop. A spiral, the representation of an infinite universe forever intertwined with itself. When the beginning goes to the end, the end goes right back to the beginning...do you see their nature now?_

"...Yes." they answered. "Take us to where they are. We know what we need to do now. We need to break the loop."

 _Then let us go to break the cycle…_

"So that's what they were talking about." the heroes thought as they were teleported to a representation of the world of Lightening. "Starting a new journey…"

Soon, Myra Michaels, the Dark Sky members, Adrian and Felix Bruce, and Nero all found themselves inside the auditorium of the Lightening world's church of Maud Pies. They were face-to-face with Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord, both of whom were casually sitting on the preacher's platform next to the podium and smirking.

"Finally...we get to show you...what we really fight against!" they proclaimed brazenly at the gods.

A chilling silence filled the room before NTG Rarity and FG Discord bluntly replied with a simple…

"Cool. So tell us, without talking like a hive mind like this. We want to hear from each one of you why you're fighting against us."

"To bring all the souls that have become lost because of you out of the darkness." Myra gave her reason.

"To show that I am done with fighting like a street thug." Adrian followed up with hers. "I fight for a cause now!"

"To prove that my sister and I were created for a reason." Felix interjected.

"Vengeance...at one point." Nero teased. "Now, I seek to honor my sister in creating a new world of light and love for her."

"Uh…" the Dark Sky members stumbled a bit as it came to their turn, as they were the only ones who never really had a reason. "Is it okay if we talk as a hive mind?"

"HA HA HA HA HA!" NTG Rarity and FG Discord burst out laughing as the other heroes gave the Dark Sky members weird looks.

"Okay, okay." Dumb-bell said as the group conceded. "My reason is that I don't want to let Fluttershy down, despite everything she put us through."

"I just enjoy being here with my friends, and meeting new ones." Hoops gave them his reason.

"..." Score silently explained the stoic's approach to dealing with a world where beings are naturally drawn to fight each other.

"Love and friendship and all that good shit!" Ghost Rainbow Dash proclaimed. "Especially the _love_ …"

"No reason!" Derpy Hooves cheerfully exclaimed to conclude everything. "I'm just here because I don't know what else to do! And I love you all!"

"OH HO HO HO HO HO HO HO HO HO HO HO!" Rarity and Discord laughed loudly again. "All of you are so lovably innocent (especially G.R.D.)! You truly are all children at heart, and do you know what makes children so adorable? Declaring aloud their simple, naive goals. And do you know what that makes adults think in response? "Who are we to tell them the truth that their dreams are never going to come true and destroy their pure-hearted joy?" Are you all not seekers of the truth? And if you are, tell us, does that way of thinking not make you sick? You should know from your trials in this tower that lies are what trap us, and that only the truth can set us free. That's what you've been taught. So is that also what you truly believe?"

"Absolutely." Myra answered without hesitating. "Do you really think your mind games are going to work on us at this point? Truth _is_ joy. If you destroy a child's joy with your own "truth", then obviously, you're not telling them the truth. You're just replacing their lies with your lies."

"It's not like we had it easy coming up here either." Adrian interjected. "I believed my own share of lies before I found the truth, and it stung! But the pain was well worth it! We're not a bunch of insecure babies!"

"Adults are just grown-up kids." Felix added. "And if they've grown up building their view of the world out of lies and convenient half-truths that merely adopt new shapes to match their new environments, then they really are in no place to be telling children what they should believe."

"Oh, for sure." Nero concurred. "Something that every child needs to know is that no adult is going to hand them the truth on a silver platter. Some don't even get the luxury of having loving parents to give them good guidance. But it's part of the challenge of life. We wouldn't be standing here facing you feeling the same sense of accomplishment if we hadn't changed at all from the experiences we've had."

"I hope you don't mind us telling you all together," said the Dark Sky members, "that we're glad you put us through this challenge, having us solve all these puzzles. That's because we enjoyed it. We enjoyed getting to do it with new friends…"

"We enjoyed watching what our truth blossomed into!" the heroes all agreed upon.

"..." Rarity and Discord said nothing in response for a while. To the surprise of the heroes, they began to blush, as if they were filled with admiration upon seeing how far they had come. Eventually, Rarity came out and said this…

"How quaint. Know, however, that we played no mind games with what we most recently said. We definitely wanted to test you one final time before our battle, but only with a question we sincerely wanted an answer to."

The heroes looked upon the gods in disbelief.

"Nice try…" they replied in a skeptical tone, despite getting a bizarre feeling that this was not part of a ruse.

"Doubt us all you wish." Discord remarked. "We are no longer intent on tricking you with our words. If you know what the truth is, then obviously, no lie we tell can lead you astray anymore. And if you know the truth, you will come to realize our true form that we have already revealed…"

"..." the heroes looked upon the gods with confusion as Rarity picked up Discord's tail with her magic and Discord took Rarity's tail in claw...and that confusion soon became horror as they realized what the two were planning to do the next time they opened their mouths…

*UMPF* *SCARF* *SLURP*

Rarity and Discord began to eat each other, simultaneously slurping each other up as they began to float and turn like a spiral would in the air. A dark aura emanated from Rarity and a light aura emanated from Discord as their bodies changed into blobs of dark energy and light energy respectively, shocking the heroes.

"They've formed the symbol of Yin-Yang…" the heroes realized. "They're planning on increasing their magical power exponentially by becoming light and dark energy themselves!"

"BECOMING?" the merging blobs replied. "NO. WE HAVE ALWAYS BEEN BEINGS OF PURE ENERGY. WE HAVE NEVER EXISTED PHYSICALLY. WE CAN NOT BE KILLED, EVEN IF YOU DO PROVE YOURSELVES STRONGER THAN US. IF YOU CAN NOT DESTROY US, WHAT WILL YOU DO TO REMOVE US FROM EXISTENCE?"

"Easy," answered the heroes, "we'll transform you into something we like."

"OH?" the blobs responded as they completed their transformation. "DOES THAT MEAN YOU DO NOT LIKE…"

Rarity and Discord had finished transforming into what looked like a lamia...only much more grotesque. They were now a monster that had the upper body of a kangaroo that had every part of its body turned inside out, including its pouch, and the lower body of a snake that had the skin of a pig instead of a reptile. The kangaroo's pouch was filled with soy sauce that looked like it was about to overflow, and the snake had a vagina that could secrete pig testicles. Rarity's face was on top of the kangaroo portion of the monster, wearing a black mask, and she wielded two ninja katanas instead of her usual one. Discord's face was on the end of the snake portion of the monster, smiling a creepy grin that showed that the fangs in his mouth were replaced with pens. As both of them laughed demonically, they finished their sentence by yelling…

"...THIS?!"

"No," they nonchalantly replied, "but it might just be an acquired taste."

"HA!" they exclaimed in response to the heroes playing around with them. "MAYBE YOU'LL SHUT THOSE SMART MOUTHS AFTER HAVING TO EAT THIS!"

Rarity waved the sword in her right arm at their legs, and suddenly, all the heroes were unable to move, with the exception of G.R.D..

"Huh?" she went in response to still being able to float. "It affects spirits too? How come I can still move around then, even though my legs feel numb…"

She then took the sword in her left arm and stabbed a Maud Pie clone who was sitting on a church bench through the chest. She lifted the Maud Pie up in the air, jerking the sword up to fling her off it before slicing her into pieces in midair and letting the remains fall into her pouch, soy sauce splashing from the reverb. Emerging from the soy sauce pool, the Maud clone's reappeared, having been turned into sushi. She was nothing more than California rolls now, yet the other Maud clones simply stared at the sight emotionlessly. They didn't even attempt to flee as Discord projected his head off the snake body, revealing an elastic neck behind it that stretched out so he could bite one of the Maud clone's through her head, then toss her into his mouth to swallow her whole. Soon, a line of smoked sausage links came out of his vagina, curling into a roll on the floor. Enraged at having to remain idle upon watching this heinous monstrosity unfold, the heroes shouted…

"YOU'RE INHUMAN! WHAT GIVES YOU THE RIGHT TO DO SOMETHING SO REPREHENSIBLE?!"

"OF COURSE WE ARE NOT HUMAN." the monster answered. "WE ARE NOT EVEN GODS. WE ARE THE AVATAR OF THE ENDLESS CYCLE OF HUMANITY AND ALL CREATURES WHO KNOW OR ONCE KNEW HUMANITY EATING ITSELF. OUR NAME IS FOOD CHAIN."

"WHAT IS IT THAT YOU MEAN TO ACCOMPLISH?!" they demanded to know.

"ACCOMPLISH?" Food Chain asked. "WE HAVE NO PERSONAL GOALS. WE EMBODY THE FUTILITY OF GOALS. NO MATTER WHAT WE DO, WE ARE AN ENDLESS SPIRAL OF INSANITY, JUST LIKE THE UNIVERSE THAT BORE US. THESE MAUD PIE CLONES ARE LIVING PROOF THAT RELIGION AND MORALS ARE JUST LIES TO KEEP US CONTROLLED BEFORE WE ARE SLAUGHTERED AND FED TO EACH OTHER."

"DON'T YOU DARE TOUCH ANY MORE OF THEM!" they bellowed furiously. "IF YOU WANT TO FIGHT LIKE A MONSTER AND NOT A WARRIOR, AT LEAST UNLEASH YOUR SAVAGERY UPON US!"

Just before they closed their mouths after saying that, Rarity waved the sword in her right arm again to keep their mouths open. This confused Myra and Nero, as their experiences with Rarity and Discord had taught them the nature of time.

"Something's off." Myra thought. "I know the reason they didn't just stop time for us completely and slice us to bits is because their power has some kind of limitation. If they had to freeze our mouths, we obviously weren't completely frozen earlier…"

"Time is endless in this world…" Nero reiterated this to himself, musing. "If time has no end, then how can time be stopped? Unless they're merely separating parts of us from time...

"GLADLY." Food Chain replied to their exclamation as it slithered closer to the heroes, towering over them. "WE HAD ALWAYS PLANNED FOR YOU TO EAT THIS!"

Rarity brought her right arm to her pouch and squeezed it to cause the sushi to fall out, while Discord slurped up the sausages and spit them out one by one at each of the hero's mouths. However, just before the flood of soy sauce hit them along with the sausage and sushi, it was repelled by a large shield of shadow that covered the heroes.

"WHAT?!" Food Chain exclaimed as they saw two glowing, green eyes emitting a purple haze appear from the shadow. "NERO?! HOW DID YOU GET OUT OF THE TIME FREEZE?!"

Suddenly, Myra's sword appeared out of the shadow, being thrown at Rarity's right arm and stabbing it, causing her to drop the katana she was holding in it in agony. It was then that the Dark Sky members appeared out of mist that materialized in the air. Dumb-Bell and Hoops grabbed the katana before it fell to the ground, and the other three drew Myra's blade from Rarity's arm. Hoops took the katana in hoof and slashed at Food Chain from the middle, where its upper and lower body connected, but no damage was done to the monster.

"Just as we thought…" he said to himself. "This blade isn't meant for offense. It separates the body parts it slices off from the slashed enemy's body, trapping those parts in a space where time doesn't pass so that those body parts can't be moved in this dimension."

"What a horrifying ability." Dumb-bell remarked. "Thank God we can turn into mist."

"Don't forget my ability to float." G.R.D. gestured to how that provided them with a clue. "Thank God I'm a ghost."

"Good thing God killed you!" Derpy happily proclaimed.

"..." Score silently commented on the importance of death in the world.

"Uh, guys…" Nero intervened as he pulled his shadow shield off of Myra, Adrian, and Felix, revealing that a demon had come out of Myra's body to toss her sword.

"Oh yeah, right." the Dark Sky members replied sheepishly, slightly embarrassed as they flew down to give the rest of the gang the katana and give Myra her blade back. "Here you go."

"That's not the issue." Myra informed them as the demon from her body receded. "Haven't you noticed anything out of place? Anything you may have _sent_ out of place?"

Taking the hint, the Dark Sky members turned around and gasped when they realized that the monster they had slashed had now disappeared.

"What?" they asked. "How did that happen?"

"You sent them both to a space where time doesn't move." Myra explained. "They can't be separated because they're intertwined with themselves. So when you hit them from the middle, you hit both of them."

"Why is that a bad thing though?" the Dark Sky members asked in confusion. "This means we win, right?"

"Not even close." Nero replied. "This is very bad. Very likely, they're now in the same space they sent the body parts they separated us from. It's even worse for me, because…"

Nero revealed as he moved away from Myra, Adrian, and Felix, that there were no parts of him left. He abandoned every part of his body except his eyes to move autonomously with the shadows that were still left inside of him.

"Oh fuck…" the Dark Sky members cursed as they realized what they had done, and the evil laughs of the monster could be heard echoing. "...why are we so stupid?! GOD DAMN IT!"

"I'm sorry, Nero!" Hoops apologized. "This is my fault! You can have my body as recompense if they destroy yours!"

"Oh no," replied Nero, "I'm not worried because I consider my body too precious. I'm worried for Spira. How unfair it would be if she were to watch what she tried so hard to cleanse of evil be chopped into food. I just don't think it's right for her to have to sacrifice any more…"

"Oh Nero…" Spira's soul thought, even able to feel what her brother was thinking from another space in time. "I don't care about whether it's fair or right...I just want to devote myself as a living sacrifice for all…"

"BWA MWA HA HA HA!" Food Chain laughed maniacally as it walked through the other dimension Spira's soul was in, which turned out to be identical to the inside of the church of the Maud Pies, only with the mouths and legs of the heroes lying around the part of the auditorium where they had been cut. Nero's body was still intact, however, missing only its eyes. Spira's soul resided in it, taking control of the very body she had given her life to cleanse…

"FABULOUS, TRULY A GEM!" Food Chain taunted Spira. "YOUR BROTHER ABANDONED THE GIFT YOU GAVE YOUR LIFE TO GIVE HIM TO ESCAPE AND LIVE ON AS SHADOW! HE TRULY IS A MODEL DEMON!"

"..." Spira felt a burning sensation inside of her soul after hearing that. A feeling of genuine anger…

"YES...WE CAN FEEL YOUR RIGHTEOUS FURY." Food Chain remarked, "sympathizing" with her. "YOU KNOW YOU HAVE EVERY RIGHT TO BE ANGRY AT HIM, ALWAYS HAVING TO BE THE ONE TO MAKE SACRIFICES. DYING RIGHTEOUS SO THAT HE CAN LIVE PROFLIGATE. WORRY NOT, HOWEVER. AFTER WE KILL YOU AND TAKE YOUR SOUL INTO US, YOU WON'T HAVE TO PUT UP WITH HIM ANY LONGER. IF YOU WERE TO WORK WITH US, YOU COULD BECOME A GOD. A GOD WHO SAVES THOSE WHO ACTUALLY DESERVE TO BE SAVED! UWA HA HA HA HA! WHAT DO YOU SAY? NO WAY YOU COULD REFUSE SUCH AN OFFER. NO WAY YOU COULD PASS THAT UP, RIGHT?"

"No way…" Spira answered in a cold monotone, showing how angry she was as she let a tremendous aura of light energy be released from her body. "No way am I letting that pass…"

"GLAD YOU CAN SEE REASON!" Food Chain exclaimed, brandishing its katana. "NOW THEN, TELL US HOW YOU WOULD LIKE TO DIE…"

"To emit my full power, I need my brother's dark energy…" Spira interjected as she also let out a tremendous aura of dark energy from her body around the light energy, stunning Food Chain. The spiral on Nero's chest began to glow as well and swirl, mesmerizing Food Chain with its hypnotic movement… "Do you honestly believe he just left me here to rot? Do you have any clue about the sacrifice he made so that we could reach our full potential?"

"TELL US ABOUT THIS POWER…" Food Chain said in a zombie-like tone, entranced. "THIS COMBINED POWER OF YIN AND YANG THAT SURPASSES EVEN OURS…"

"No way do you deserve to know." Spira replied, giving them a furious glare, her eyes emitting a fiery red haze. "Not after what you said. You're not getting away with that…"

"WITH WHA-UUUUUMMMMMPPPPPHHHHH!" Food Chain cried, as Spira, with lightning fast speed, pulled Discord's head out of Food Chain's lower body and dragged it all the way up to Rarity's head on the upper body to shove his head down her throat.

"NO WAY AM I LETTING YOU GET AWAY WITH CALLING MY BROTHER A DEMON AFTER HE SACRIFICED HIS BODY TO SAVE ME AND OUR FRIENDS!" Spira shouted.

The power Spira poured into the blow she used to shove Discord's head down Rarity's throat was so great, that Discord's head carried Food Chain's entire lower body down Rarity's esophagus, causing the creature to eat itself, rolling into a spiral that eventually imploded with a resounding pop. A huge mess of blood, flesh, soy sauce, sausage, and pig semen went everywhere before two giant waves of light and dark energy were sent out, melting away the alternate dimension and causing Spira to reappear in the air back in the regular dimension. All of the heroes noticed that they could move every part of their body again, just as they noticed an unconscious Spira beginning to fall...along with a conscious Rarity and Discord, who had been restored to their original forms.

"YOU WILL SHOW US YOUR POWER!" the gods exclaimed as Rarity got out her sword and Discord charged up a magic blast in his claw.

Before they could reach Spira in the air, however, Nero quickly extended an arm made of shadow to grab his sister in its hand and pull her down to safety. Rarity and Discord were about to be reached in the air as well, though by less comforting hands. The two could see what awaited them below as Adrian smiled a sinister smile, holding two beakers of red liquid in her fists as she jumped up in the air, ready to give both of them the finishing blow.

 _So we're going to out like fireworks. What a truly fabulous way to end it all._

Ninja Time God Rarity said those words as Adrian gave an uppercut to her chest and Discord's chest, pushing her fists through their bodies to plant Felix's explosive concoctions inside.

 _More importantly, however, is the truly wonderful way we're going to begin again though._

Fantasy God Discord said those words as his body and Rarity's turned red and took on the shapes of firework rockets, flying off in all sorts of directions and propelling streams of light and dark energy before finally colliding with each other…

*BOOM* *WAPING* *ACHING* *BING* *BANG*

A massive explosion that caused light and dark sparks to form and dissipate occurred, following in both the Maud Pie clones and the heroes looking up to watch in awe.

"What is this feeling?" the Maud Pies asked themselves in confusion of their excitement. "This feeling of fascination?"

"It's the joy of watching something finally be completed." the heroes answered them. "Those gods may have been totally insane, but they were totally devoted on seeing their story out to the end. They killed and destroyed the lives of many, but everyone they've hurt will have a chance to begin again. They were done with their work of creating insanity and feeling enmity for those who didn't understand the spirit of their art, wanting to move on to create something that would make the spirits of even those who have long forgotten how to feel true joy marvel in childlike wonder once more…"

"How do you know this?" the Maud Pies asked with genuine curiosity.

The heroes then told them the final words of Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord…

 _Because we have passed on our spirits to the ones we sought to make stronger through our story…_

It was then that the heroes instinctively turned around and saw Discord's pen and book lying near the church podium.

"Could this be it?" they asked themselves as they walked over to the pen and book. "Could this be the end? There is still the Trinity and The Reborn One...but this feeling...it feels like it would be so satisfying to just end the story right now..."

 _No. There is no way you can end the story right now. Not...be...fore…be..._

These are the words the true god spoke before the heroes wrote an ending in the book.

 _Once Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord were defeated, the heroes were all teleported home to their respective worlds, feeling wiser and stronger._

 _Myra Michaels found herself working at Phoenext alongside Edward Miles and Dawn Dedde. They were now a team of soldiers hired by Nick Rohn to rid the world of evil demons. Phoenext's days of oppressing the innocent were no more, as like the land, its leader had been purified by fire and light…_

 _Adrian and Felix finally returned home to their parents and told them how they honestly felt for the first time, revealing that they knew of the secret of their conception from Noimman. Cristo and Krysta immediately apologized...and knowing an apology wasn't enough, they allowed Adrian and Felix to leave the house and do what they wished with their lives, no longer bound by the past. The path their parents had planned for them then was now only in the past…_

 _Nero eventually convinced Spira to keep his body that she had purified for him...under the condition that Nero took up residence in her body. Spira had discovered what had given her such strength in the battle with Rarity and Discord aside from her righteous fury and love, her soul of light merging with Nero's body of darkness. And after she had told her brother this secret, it wasn't long before his soul of darkness merged with Spira's body of light. Soon, the two of them had finally become a complete form through their strong bond…_

 _The Dark Sky members went on to have an excellent adventure. Dumb-bell got lucky in getting hooked up with a nice Chinese lady who gave him his wang back, Hoops got courted by Shaquille O' Neal at a basketball game while Score silently kept score, and Ghost Rainbow Dash played another prank on Derpy Hooves by possessing the skeletons in her closet that had to be let out while Derpy was cleaning. Thankfully, Derpy finally found the gang's instruments after G.R.D. finally came out of the closet...for Dumb-bell. She blushed as he scolded her for the prank and gave him a kiss. Derpy just didn't know why she was so enamored with him. Was she just happy he got his wang back?_

 _However, while the Dark Sky members were happy to be back, there were bigger questions of concern than romance and wangs. When the gang returned to Fluttershy's mansion, they found that she was nowhere around. Where was she? Where was Twilight Sparkle? But the most important question of all, where...wa...s…S…_

"Ha ha ha ha ha." three spirits watching from above laughed, unseen from blending in disguise with the lights in the dark night sky. Emerging from the stars, the souls of Twilight, Fluttershy, and Spike appeared, the three spirits who had become the Trinity of The Reborn One...

"You ask such questions believing that a time will come soon for them to be answered." Twilight remarked. "Unfortunately, that won't be the case. They at least won't be answered for you in the state you're in."

"When you killed Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord," explained Fluttershy, "you became their successors. And like them, you must undergo the same ultimate fate...being transformed into something truly beautiful…"

"The stories of all you heroes have ended, whether you realize it or not…" Spike said ominously. "The end is going to come for all, and there is nothing that can be done to stop it. The only thing that you can do is create a new beginning for the spiriting...in a new form…MWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!"

 _They do realize their story has ended. They only cut me off because they already knew. They don't care about the end...all they care about is the new beginning that we all wish for…_

These were the last words the true god spoke before the end came to an end…


	24. Chapter 24

Episode 24: What the End Truly is

 _There was nothing left for the true god to say…_

 _...so is this the end?_

 _Indeed it is. This is the true end that has finally ended…_

 _...so now we begin…_

 _Remember the most important story of all that had yet to begin._

 _It finally starts after we can answer the question of what life is._

 _Puzzling as it has been, we have finally come to the conclusion thanks to our heroes._

 _So let us watch them rise again in new forms...for the SPIRITing…_

The Dark Sky members were still in Fluttershy's mansion that night, wondering what was going on. As all of them sat around in the living room, they discussed their concerns with each other.

"Do any of you get the feeling we still haven't left Starcatch?" Dumb-bell asked.

"I do." Hoops answered. "Even though the true god has not contacted us since we beat Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord once and for all, he did say that our challenge there didn't end with that world. This lack of a sense of accomplishment is making me feel more inclined to believe him now than ever."

"..." Score silently spoke of how nihilism ironically draws people closer to God.

"All play and no work makes Jack a chronic masturbator!" Ghost Rainbow Dash exclaimed, intentionally rewording the classic reference. "If it's true we got unfinished business, sign me up, because I'm already bored of being on vacation. I'm a ghost, for Pete's sake! My whole existence is one big vacation from life!"

"But if what you say is true," chimed in Derpy Hooves, "wouldn't that mean Jack works out a lot?"

"Come on, Derpy." G.R.D. retorted. "Even I wouldn't be caught dead doing that at the gym."

"It seems we all agree that our work here isn't done yet." Dumb-bell concluded. "I say that first thing tomorrow morning, we investigate this new area we've arrived in. If the true god was correct, then this should be another world where the world of the Awakening project and the world of the Transcending project are intertwined...weird as it sounds."

"Wait, why can't we just start investigating now?" G.R.D. questioned. "The night's our time to shine! They don't call us members of the _Dark Sky_ for no reason…"

"Think two steps ahead, G.R.D." Hoops said, glaring up suspiciously. "If we're night owls, then the rats know the right time to hide…"

"Heh heh heh…" the Trinity laughed from above, knowing that they were onto them. "Clever. You know we won't show ourselves this night. Confronting you then wouldn't be in our favor. We want to wait until the day, where everyone around can see us. We are not mere spooks who only come out at night…we are eternal spirits who are always with you, even after the night's end..."

They said this as the stars in the night sky began to glow ominously…

"I'm sure our friends, the spirits of the dream realm, will show you that…"

After the Dark Sky members went to bed, with Dumb-bell, Hoops, and Score sleeping on the couch, G.R.D. sleeping in the living room table, and Derpy sleeping on the floor, using the rug on the floor as a blanket, they all soon found themselves in the dream realm…

"Huh?" they reacted as they looked around and saw nothing but stars in the night sky around them. "What's going on? What is this place?"

"This is the dream realm." the stars in the night sky answered them. "Though you are all dreaming right now, what you are experiencing at this moment is certainly real."

"And we feel inclined to believe you." the Dark Sky members said, feeling the spiritual energy emanating from the stars. "You're not just figments in our heads. You're all real spirits...created in the minds of gods…"

"Precisely." the stars answered. "This is a fantasy world where the gods create the souls that will occupy the bodies of the mortals in a world of reality. Just as one thinks up the characters in a story before writing those characters in the story. Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord kept all the potential characters they could create here after they formed an agreement with Princess Luna. Permission to use this place at their leisure in exchange for permission to access Fluttershy's mansion. I guess all that is irrelevant now, however, considering the ultimate fate of them all..."

"No, it's all still very relevant." the Dark Sky members retorted. "We've promised to carry on Rarity and Discord's will. As for Luna and Fluttershy, we've not given up on them. Why would we ever when we've got a whole eternity to bring them back?"

"Ha ha ha." the stars laughed. "We do enjoy your attitudes being so optimistic for undead servants. But pessimism was not what we meant to imply…"

"Then what did you mean?" the Dark Sky members asked.

"In calling the past irrelevant in concern to their ultimate fates," explained the stars, "we didn't mean to say that the past doesn't matter because they're "gone" now...we meant that the past doesn't matter because they're going to exist in the future no matter what."

"!" the Dark Sky members were taken aback, and immediately thought to say…

"Wait, how are Luna and Fluttershy going to exist in the future?! Are they still going to be puppets of The Reborn One?! You have to tell us!"

"Alas, we can not." the stars replied. "We are merely puppets of The Trinity, commanded by them to bring you a message."

Now knowing that these stars were not on their side, the Dark Sky members relented and solemnly told them in response…

"Alright. What's the memo?"

"The spiriting commences tomorrow morning." the stars answered, speaking in a foreboding voice. "We will be coming back...and we're going to love our new toys…"

With that, the stars around the Dark Sky members vanished, and in their place, the souls of Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy, and Spike appeared before them.

"No way…" the Dark Sky members remarked. "Don't tell us that you guys are…"

"Don't show such surprise," retorted Twilight, "acting like you really believe that we've done something truly wicked. Do you even know what the spiriting is?"

"It's a virtuous mission." Fluttershy purported. "We're going to bring all the dead who claim to be among the living back to life…"

"...Will that include us?" the Dark Sky members asked curiously. "We are "undead servants" as your lackeys put it, after all…"

"Don't play dumb." Spike taunted. "You were all there with him when you decided that your world needed to be brought back to life...you were all there with our boss...The Reborn One…"

"You couldn't possibly be talking about…" the Dark Sky members said as they began to wake up, slowly leaving the dream realm as Twilight, Fluttershy, and Spike faded away before them.

"...him...someone so sweet and innocent…is the one behind everything?!"

At that moment, a church bell began to ring, and all of the members' eyes flew open in response. Going over to a window, they looked out and saw a large, black-colored church with a white-colored roof in the distance. On top of the roof was a crystal statue of Spike, holding a dark ball in one hand and a light ball in the other.

"I don't know about you guys, but I don't feel like sleeping in this morning…" Dumb-bell remarked in a serious tone despite being aware of the irony in his comment.

"So that's where we're going to start investigating…" Hoops said forebodingly as the gang disappeared into dark mist and rematerialized outside of the church.

"..." Score silently remarked on the history of corruption in the church.

"Guess there's no irony here for once." G.R.D. commented. "It's like, gee, I wonder why The Trinity would be hiding in a suspicious-looking church. I thought that after Rarity and Discord kicked the bucket, they would've left behind originality. Poor souls are rolling in their graves right now, I tell ya."

"I know, right?" Derpy replied, trying to jive with the conversation. "It's like, nothing's original anymore. The society from Idiocracy is real now. It just feels that people are fine with being these mindless puppets who don't care that they're being manipulated. And that's just really sad. Find the answers for yourself, damn it! Don't just sit around and wait for some magical ghost to come in your room and tell you everything!"

Every other Dark Sky member turned to Derpy and gave her a blank stare before G.R.D. interjected…

"Nope, I was wrong about there being no irony. This world is a parody of itself."

"Good on you for figuring that out!" a familiar voice shouted from above. "At least the sky being blue isn't something you have to look up to find out!"

"That reminds me," thought Derpy, "where did I put my phone?"

As Derpy looked around, the rest of the gang looked up to see Crazy Celes hanging out of the sky, only showing her upper body. The rest of her was hidden under the sky.

"Don't ask me what I'm doing," interjected Celes, "I'm just hanging for murder in the first degree! Good thing it never gets too hot up here!"

"..." the gang just stayed silent, trying to ignore her as they went towards the church.

"Wait!" Celes exclaimed as she saw them opening the church doors. "I can tell you whatever you want to know! I'm very high up! I've spoken with God!"

After only getting the response of the church doors slamming as the Dark Sky members entered, Celes sighed in discontent.

"I guess they've got their hooves full with their own investigation." Celes surmised. "Maybe it's for the best I don't tell them where I buried her…"

Celes said that last part ominously as a familiar dark aura began to exude from the ground…

As the Dark Sky members entered the church, they were surprised to find not The Trinity awaiting them, but instead, a funeral service being conducted by another familiar face. A fourteen-year-old boy with blue and white hair, dressed in a white robe like the one Discord wore, was standing at a podium. He was giving a eulogy for someone in an open black casket, whom the Dark Sky members couldn't see from the distance. About to finish his speech, he concluded it as such…

"And we will all miss this fallen one as we shall miss all our fallen heroes. May they return to the gods and become a new Trinity…"

Knowing what he was referring to, the Dark Sky members gasped in horror and shouted out…

"SKY!"

Ponies who were attending the service turned their heads towards the Dark Sky members as Sky looked up and responded to them with…

"That's my first name. Last name is Wanderer."

"Thanks for the info…" the members replied facetiously. "What we want to know though are the names of those "fallen heroes"..."

"Tell you those names, I can not." Sky declined solemnly.

"Why's that?" the members asked indignantly.

"Because these heroes no longer have names." Sky explained as he turned his attention to the casket. "When they left this world, they abandoned the identities of their former selves completely in order to become new forms. All three of them have been reborn with new names…"

"Three?" the members asked in confusion.

"Indeed." Sky answered. "For these heroes are now a new Trinity…"

"Yeah right!" the members exclaimed. "Don't think you can trick us with such a transparent lie! This is just another trap! If you want us to believe something so farfetched, why don't you prove it?!"

"My sentiments exactly." another recognizable character chimed in, a blue stallion with cyan and white hair speaking with a British accent. "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence…"

"That voice...it's Water Rinse." the Dark Sky members said what they realized in thought. "Now that we know that he and Sky are here, we have our proof that this world is a mixture of the Transcending world and the Awakening world. The true god was telling the truth…"

"So the burden of proof lies on me?" Sky retorted. "Alright, I'm fine with carrying that weight like a man...under the condition that you tell me what _you_ believe. Can you tell me what exactly happened to our heroes?"

"...They died." Water Rinse said after a long pause. "That's it. They no longer exist in this world. And that's all we can say for certain."

"Are you fucking serious?!" the Dark Sky members yelled. "That's what you have to say after all the insane stuff that's happened in this universe?! If you don't have any hope for our friends, then why the hell did you come to their funeral?!"

"Better yet," interjected Sky, grinning deviously, "why are you even alive at all if that's how you view death? Do you mean to tell me that you actually enjoy pretending to be a good guy while believing that there's no point in being a good guy? Do you enjoy living just for fun while not actually having fun? Does it actually give you pleasure creating and burning your strawman of Mr. Fairytale, someone who at least knows what they believe in, while you don't even know why you get out of bed in the morning?"

"Shut your fucking mouth, you deranged twat!" Water yelled furiously. "You don't know anything about me! So what if you're in a better place than me?! What does it mean to the world if I'm not happy?! I play my part! I do the best I can to be the best person I can be, even as I keep seeing that I'm never good enough! I give, the world takes, I hold everything inside so that everyone else can be happy, do I really need to suffer any more than I already do?!"

"Oh ho ho," laughed Sky in a way that was reminiscent to Rarity and Discord's guffaws, "you truly are more deluded than I could ever hope to be. If all life is to you is suffering, just die. Don't pretend that the world is holding you hostage to it and that your loved ones won't get over it. You'll be happier that way regardless of what you believe. But if you still insist on living while you are dead on the inside…"

Sky gave an evil grin before he took a deep breath and breathed out magical gas that had dark purple, yellow, and light purple colors in it. It covered everyone in the church, including the Dark Sky members. However, they did not feel any effect from it, even as they breathed it in.

"What the hell is this stuff supposed to do?" they thought in perplexment as the gas soon dissipated. Seeing Water Rinse standing ahead of them, still close to Sky, they decided to ask him…

"Hey, Water, are you feeling alright?"

"Yeah, I'm feeling good." he replied in a tone that sounded normal, to their surprise.

"Oh, that's a relief." the members responded. "We were worried that something bad would happen to you."

"What difference would that make?" Water asked ominously. "After all…"

Water then abruptly turned around to show that his face was dark blue and corroding while his eyes were blank white, unnerving the Dark Sky members.

"Nothing bad is going to stop me from always being good." he finished in a creepy monotone. "That is what I live for. To be good. That's all there is to life. Being good. We just have to do it…"

The Dark Sky members then began to back away slowly, watching the other members in the church get up and show them that they had undergone the same transformation as Water. They began to repeat in a zombie-like tone…

"We have to be good. We have to be good…"

Finally, Sky finished what he had begun to say earlier…

"...I WILL GLADLY ACCOMMODATE YOU."

Looking at him, the Dark Sky members gritted their teeth and growled, knowing that he was being controlled by the souls of The Trinity whom they could sense…

"We ought to transform into our holy dragon form right now and blast them…" they thought. "But we can't have Sky and everyone else get caught in the crossfire. All we can do right now is run, hide, and think of a plan."

With that in mind, the members bolted out of the doors behind them and running out into the field, looked around for somewhere safe to lie.

"Ugh…" they thought as they looked up and realized what may have been the only feasible option. "We can't go back to the mansion, The Trinity knows we were staying there. Taking to the skies seems like the best option, but we don't want to have to deal with that maniac, and it's the first place they'd expect a group of pegasi to go. We'd prefer to stay on the ground if we can...but something feels wrong about the soil…"

A purple hand abruptly bursting from the ground confirmed the group's doubts.

"Of fucking course…" they thought as they saw the hand lifting its body out of the grave. "Wait a minute, that can't be…"

"Buried underground…" the figure rising from the ground hummed forebodingly. "Lost and never found. Waiting for my word. Seen but never heard. Buried underground...but I'll keep coming."

The Dark Sky members reviled in terror as the figure revealed itself to be Noimman. She clicked her fingers, causing all the dirt that had covered her to disappear from her body and give her a fresh, clean outfit like the one she had worn at the school.

"So what's up?" Noimman nonchalantly greeted them, before realizing that the gang had taken off towards the skies. "Oh...I guess that's what's up."

The Dark Sky members puffed and panted, flapping their wings as hard as they could to fly as far away as they could.

"How the hell did she end up here?!" they shouted in disbelief. "I thought we finished her off for good back at the carnival!"

"Finish someone off for good?" Crazy Celes retorted as she abruptly appeared on a cloud in front of the gang, who stopped flying as they saw her. "You clearly don't watch enough horror movies!"

"Such deplorable social skills." Noimman remarked as she abruptly appeared on a cloud behind the game. "It's not even like I've come back good as new. I'm still bound by my own darkness, so I couldn't do much harm to you even if I wanted."

It was then that Noimman transformed herself into the black blob she had become after Adrian and Felix defeated her last, revealing that nothing had changed since then.

"I have no personal motives left for power and destruction." she told them as she reverted back to her human form. "Even if I refused to accept my punishment, I'd be imprisoned by my own darkness forever and that's it. It wasn't my hand that brought me back here. It was the work of both Celes and Yata, who wanted my help for combatting The Reborn One. In short, we're allies here."

"Like hell!" the Dark Sky members retorted in distrust. "Show us some damn proof!"

"As you wish…" a voice from a cloud above them answered. Another figure turned their head from the cloud to face the members below, revealing himself to be Yata. The Dark Sky members were stunned, but also pleasantly surprised.

"So it's legit?" they asked. "You all really do just want to help us defeat the The Reborn One?"

"Of course." Yata replied. "Though before we can help you, each of you need to take a step back and truly assess what you're doing…"

"Interesting…" Dumb-bell said, remembering how Rarity and Discord had asked them to break out of their hive mind. "Tell us, what exactly is the issue? What do we need to work on?"

"Finding out why you do what you do." Yata answered. "What is it that you fight for? What sets you apart from those zombies? Back when you took down Rarity and Discord with the other heroes, you did so without really understanding what gave you the strength to stand up to them. You purported to fight for love, fun, and friendship, but anyone can say they fight for broad, interchangeable concepts of these things. What you need to do for yourselves is start fighting for _definitive_ concepts of these things that you know to be true."

"I get what you're saying." Hoops chimed in. "When we fought with the other heroes, we knew our idea of the truth was not as mature and firmly founded as theirs. We didn't work for our truth like they did, we mostly just trusted what we already knew…"

"..." Score silently delved into the challenge of faith and finding the truth.

"And to think we've been so nonchalant…" G.R.D. reflected on their past, feeling honest regret. "I can't believe I actually complained about our enemies not having originality…"

"I know!" Derpy exclaimed, having regrets herself as well. "Just because zombie apocalypse shit has been done to death, doesn't mean they're not allowed to do something original with it and succeed!"

"Indeed!" Crazy Celes exclaimed in tandem. "If they can succeed at transforming masses into mindless zombies, why shouldn't they try?! I have to give my son a pat on the back for such ingenuity!"

"How did you know he was the one who turned those ponies into zombies?" Derpy asked.

"Because Yata is God, you idiot!" Celes yelled. "It's not like he sees everything that happens, he fills the air with invisible surveillance cameras!"

"And speaking of cameras…" Yata said as he pulled out a disk from his shirt. "I never got to give this to Nero. Or should I say Nira...Spero?"

"Huh?" Hoops responded. "Wait, since you're God, you must know what happened to Nero and the rest of the heroes! Please, tell us!"

"Don't you already know?" Yata retorted. "They took on new forms. They are not mortals anymore. They're gods now, just like me."

"..." the Dark Sky members were silent for a long time...before Score finally broke the silence by asking Yata, saying normally…

"How did that happen? Please don't answer in riddles...just tell us like the true god would...just tell us the truth..."

"Answer in riddles?" Yata replied. "How could I? There is nothing mysterious concerning what happened to your comrades. They each wrote the ending of their story, and thus, their mortal lives came to an end. They knew that as they were in their state, there was no longer any reason for them to exist in this universe. Myra Michaels, Adrian and Felix Bruce, Spira, and Nero have all died."

… _.shwoosh….._

A silent gust of chilling wind blew past the Dark Sky members as they surveyed their surroundings in self-reflection. The sight of the clouds made them think of the mist they had the ability to become...and then they thought about The Reborn One again…

"So that's why he did it. It was never about some convoluted evil plan concocted to build himself up as the most powerful being in the universe...and it was also never about some insane madman scheme designed to make everyone suffer. It was just about finishing that story. He didn't do it for love and recognition and he didn't do it for hate and sadistic pleasure. He just feels that the right time has finally come to finish the story while also keeping it going somehow…"

All of the Dark Sky members smiled widely while also crying tears of joy as they finally understood why The Reborn One did what he did. They were even more happy, however, when they realized how it tied in with what happened to their friends.

"If the true ending to a story of fiction never ends…"

They said this as they transformed themselves into mist one last time and dissipated into the sky…

"...then the same can be applied to a story of reality…"

 _That is the story that can finally begin…_

The Dark Sky members, as they were, faded away.

 _THE HEROES ARE DEAD_

 _READ THE ORDER HARD_

"MWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!" The Trinity laughed evilly. "FINALLY! AT LAST, THE MIST HAS RETURNED TO US! THE REBORN ONE WILL BECOME A PERFECT BEING AND BRING ABOUT THE SPIRITING AT LONG LAST!"

Knowing what The Trinity was gloating about, Yata smirked as he could be seen walking through a dark place filled with floating, green digital code. He was approaching the tower of Starcatch with the disk he wanted to give Nero in hand…

"I'm glad I waited until this moment to finally send this to my old friend." Yata said happily. "Because now, he has new friends that I can share this with. The story of two youths who rose up against the embodiment of hatred while refusing to give in to hatred themselves is something that the modern world needs to fully believe as a story of reality…isn't that right, Robot Alicorn Twilight?"

"INDEED." the voice of the familiar cyborg boomed from Starcatch. "THAT STORY SHALL BE ETERNALLY PRESERVED AS DIGITAL DATA. EVERY MORTAL STORY, WHETHER REAL OR FICTIONAL, WILL EXIST FOREVER AS COMPUTER DATA INSIDE OF ME. REALITY AND FANTASY SHALL BE FOREVER INTERTWINED, AND AN ETERNAL TRUTH SHALL BE MADE TRUE TO ALL WHO LIVE. THEY WILL KNOW THE ONE THING THAT KEEPS REALITY AND FANTASY SEPARATE…"

Yata then uploaded the disk that held this secret Twilight's robot self spoke of, and with this, the fate of everyone in the universe coming awake was inevitable. The first one who would realize the truth was once an ordinary youth who only wanted to know the answer to a question he asked his mother…because Twilight's robot self had always been with him since the Transcending project, he was the first to ask those who surrounded him…

"Can you please explain to me what you guys are doing?" he asked the zombies he hadn't even realized he had inadvertently helped create from being under the spell of The Trinity.

In response, the zombies turned to him, giving him menacing glares…

"We have to be good…" they told them in a creepy monotone.

"But it's not enough to just be good." Sky interjected. "You need a reason to be good to do good. If you don't believe that there's a purpose for doing the good you do, where's the joy in that?"

"Joy?" the zombies asked. "What's that? Are you questioning our right to be zombies?"

"No." Sky answered. "I'm just asking, why would you want to be zombies? Why are you denying the fact that you're not satisfied with a life that doesn't bring you happiness?"

"Evil…" the zombies replied in a tone that was creepier than before. "You are evil...to question our beliefs is to question good itself...for that you must pay…we shall bring justice upon you..."

"No, you shall not." the souls of another trinity that opposed the one that transformed the ponies in the church into zombies materialized in the air, speaking out against their behavior. "Sky has said nothing wrong. Even if he had used his words as a way to harm and deceive you, it would not be your duty to punish him. It would be mine. How do you who speak of good not believe and stay secure in a higher power of good?"

"And how do you actually believe such words will wake these zombies up?" The Trinity gloated. "You know logic and reason doesn't work on those as far gone as them. The only thing that will wake them up from their illusion is death itself, for what made them this way was their mortal minds being corrupted by a disgusting mortal world. We will send them to inhabit new bodies in our new world, for only then will they see the truth…"

"Very wrong." the other trinity interjected. "The truth is best taken to the grave, but only through life is the truth found in the first place. Wishing death on those who don't believe the truth is foolishness, and bringing death on them is unpardonable. Belief in the truth is also trust in the truth making itself known to those who don't believe. We trust in these good souls that have been led astray."

"You trust?" The Trinity taunted again. "You're the one who's foolish. Having faith in mortals, hopeless creatures who trust in a false idea of God to show them the way. Their only hope is to destroy themselves in nihilism and nonbelief before real gods like ourselves save them."

The Trinity then turned to the zombies that had long been silent.

"Now tear this degenerate who dared to defy you and I apart!" The Trinity commanded. "And prove that our word alone is the truth!"

"..." Water Rinse and the other zombies just stayed silent...and eventually began to cry…

"What?!" The Trinity cried in disbelief of this sight. "Why won't you obey me?! I AM EVERYTHING YOU BELIEVE! I AM YOUR VOICE!"

The zombies smiled, crying tears of joy as they felt their flesh returning to normal.

"No, I think we can speak for ourselves, thank you very much." Water Rinse made a sarcastic remark. "We want to go back to the real world now. We no longer have interest in this fairytale…"

The Trinity just stared at the restored ponies dumbfounded before they faded away, returning to the world their reality, now having the intention to make it a happy one…

"Now do you understand?" the other trinity said. "You have nothing if you know the truth but don't have trust in others. Those ponies saw that the trust in our truth gave us hope and love for the lost. It's not possible for the good to see that love and continue living the lie that the good they do is a meaningless chore. Trust in them, and they will trust in what they really believe."

"...Does that mean….." The Trinity finally replied after a long pause. "You trust in us as well?"

"Of course," replied the other trinity, "for you were only misguided as well. True evil knows the lie and wishes to corrupt the believers in the truth with lies. Such evil has influence on us all. Breaking free of that influence is the challenge The Reborn One gave the mortals of this universe. We know neither of you are truly evil...we just need to wake you up and have you live again..."

"...Show us." The Trinity requested. "Show us who you are...and we shall return the favor by revealing who The Reborn One is…"

The other trinity listened to their request. They split apart into three souls that revealed their true forms one by one as they moved to the floor. A woman with spiked up black hair, a black ninja outfit, mask, and cloak, and a sword and a katana in her hands appeared, followed by another woman who had a red, punk-styled hairdo, was dressed in a white shirt and white shorts, and had skin that continually changed color, and finally, a shadow pony made of dark energy that glowed with a magnificently radiant light and had glowing white eyes that exuded dark energy of pure black. In response, The Trinity split themselves apart to show the souls of Twilight, Fluttershy, and Spike.

"I knew it." Twilight said. "Besides The Reborn One, only you could have wisdom surpassing our understanding. You are the heroes who have taken on the forms of true gods, forms that even the heroes of the Awakening project couldn't achieve. You are…"

"Myrick D. Miles."

"Fadrian Willis."

"Spiro."

"Unlike the heroes from the Awakening project, you three chose the truth in the end." Fluttershy commended them. "For that, you deserve to know who our maker, the true creator of the Spiriting project is."

"It's the last one you'd ever suspect it to be…" Spike told them ominously. "Even though it's been very obvious from the start the only one who could've done all this, it will change the way you see everything once you learn that The Reborn One's true identity is…"

"...you, Spike." Myrick, Fadrian, and Spiro finished his sentence for him in an emotionless tone of voice. "We knew the whole time, we just showed you our real forms to show that we trusted you."

Twilight, Fluttershy, and Spike stared blankly at them for a while before they burst out laughing, and the heroes joined in on the laughter as well. It was true. The Reborn One was Spike, and he had been right in front of them all along…

...however, the Spike who was part of The Trinity was not The Reborn One...the Spike who was The Reborn One was the lone survivor...the embodiment of the story's beginning and end…

He would begin the spiriting...end the confusion...revive the soul of the dark sky...


	25. Chapter 25

Episode 25: Transcending Light of Risen Souls

 _Fluttershy…_

Spike said this one word in his mind as he floated through the dark sky, touching every star he came across, causing each star to shine more brilliantly.

 _Is this really what you want in the end?_

Putting his hand away, Spike stopped drifting through the sky as he landed on a black cloud that began to elevate him upwards.

 _Great power is bestowed on you time after time, yet you always choose to end it this way, with an ending that shows that there really is no ending to our insane universe if you really think about it…_

In the sky above where Spike was headed, a familiar spiral could be seen swirling in the air. It looked exactly like the spiral that had appeared over Nero and Spira's castle in the world of the heralds…

 _Heaven...hell...oblivion...endless nothingness...even reincarnation...they are all beliefs mortals are drawn to in search of a coping mechanism to deal with the harshest reality of all...eternity._

Reaching up to the spiral with both of his hands, Spike emitted a familiar dark mist from his palms that soon enveloped his entire body. The cloud he had rested upon enshrouded him as well as he was carried closer and closer to the spiral…

 _To deny it is foolishness, to accept it is the toughest challenge the mortal mind faces in a world that tells them again and again not to accept it, yet you must try again and again to accept it in order to find the truth...this is the truth you all worked so hard to learn...so tell me, my heroes...what will you do…_

Illuminating brighter than ever was the dark sky as its ruler merged with the two great evils that made him a monster...the cloud and the mist that completed the dragon's primary trinity…

"To defeat me, the very one who gave all your souls the reason for your eternity?" Spike asked, genuinely curious of how the heroes would be able to fight him after knowing his true form…

…

"Never give up our spirit."

This is the resolve our heroes who had become gods demonstrated to The Trinity.

"Unwavering determination is indeed the core defining trait of an unstoppable spirit." Twilight said. "However, you must then ask yourself what gives you that determination. And the answer is simple. Knowledge. Without your knowledge of your own truth, you would never have come this far. So now, in order to defeat The Reborn One, you must be able to comprehend _our_ truth..."

"We want nothing more than to understand you." Myrick D. Miles answered. "Please enlighten us to everything. Why did you and The Reborn One do all this? What is the reason for all the suffering, pain, and confusion you have brought on the world in the way you have? We know that you have good intentions in what you are doing, that you are bringing darkness upon mortals so that they may fight it to find the light, but did it really have to be this way?"

"According to The Reborn One, yes." Fluttershy replied. "According to The Risen One, no. Both of them brought different kinds of darkness upon mortals. And us? We are just creations from mortals who follow his orders."

"Do you mean to say that you were originally humans?" Fadrian Willis asked for clarification. "Never once have I gotten the vibe that you were the real Twilight, Fluttershy, and Spike, or even magical creatures to begin with. I sense that your history is rooted in humanity…"

"Your sense is correct." Spike assured. "Not only us, but no one in this universe is the "real version" of the character they embody. They're all impostors, just clones made from human beings meant to replace the citizens of Equestria who died at the end of the first story of Fluttershy's Dark Sky…"

"So it's all just been one big fairy tale from the very beginning…" Spiro chimed in. "The real mastermind behind the creation of this story was never those ridiculous characters of Rarity and Discord. It was the "real Spike" the whole time. Now it's all making sense what his true motive behind all this is. He couldn't handle the fact that all his friends had left him, so he created us to cope with his solitude. But eventually, he also became unable to handle the fact that we weren't actually real, so he tapped into dark magic to turn his fiction into reality. That's why he used real humans as the base for recreating his pony friends...that's why he's involving the souls of everyone in the universe...he wants his fantasy to be completely intertwined with the real world!"

"And that's only the beginning…"

These were the words spoken by the one who had only ever spoken to congratulate the heroes...until now…

"Yes, it's me...how ironic that the one who congratulated the very first set of heroes to experience my very first story for knowing how to separate fantasy from reality is now trying to bring the two together. Marvelous how the times change even as time is endless. Not that my change of opinion made any difference. Paint the locomotive a different color, and it still goes to the same destination. You can't change its direction. That's one thing that makes mortals so amusing. They actually believe that their opinions make such a profound impact on their world. Half-truths that they act like they would die for before they discard them in favor of another belief more attuned to their current state without hesitation. Things that they loathe in secret but never actually confront. Countless dreams that they think about every day yet never actually pursue. They would resent me if they ever knew who I truly was...but why? All I want to do is take them away from their boring lives. I want to give them a chance to find the truth, to find true happiness so that they will no longer look for someone to hate and blame for their misery. When my world of fantasy becomes intertwined with reality, the spirits brought to this world will have a chance at making any dream of theirs come true. Now that you heroes, the ones who fought so hard for the truth, are now gods, do you understand me?"

"Yes." the heroes solemnly replied. "We completely understand you. In fact, we also share your vision and would like to join you."

"Do not mock me…" the "real Spike" said in bemusement as he materialized out of dark mist that magically appeared in front of the heroes, adjacent to the souls of The Trinity. "I sense it in your aura, I know you want to fight me."

"Absolutely." the heroes admitted. "But we want to understand you more too. We know you're just like Ninja Time God Rarity and Fantasy God Discord. We feel a piece of your soul poured inside of them, and in turn, we feel that the root behind all this wickedness you have done is not an evil demon, but a misguided child with an intention of innocence. We know that the two great evils that the true god spoke of, the ones that have made you a monster Spike, are the cloud and the mist…"

"That's right…" the dragon said as he emitted a cloud of light energy from his right palm and a veil of dark mist from his left palm. "I am the cloud dragon of the mist."

He covered not only himself with the cloud and the mist like he had done earlier, but also the souls of The Trinity, bringing them and himself into a spiral that magically appeared behind them, swirling clockwise…

"The spiral also represents fusion…" he said as a bright light illuminated the entire church and brought him and the heroes to another realm. They were all teleported to the first world of Fluttershy's Dark Sky, where the heroes found themselves floating in a starry night sky just as Spike was earlier. "Not just endlessness...but endless intertwinement…"

The heroes braced themselves as they saw the spiral in front of them appear as a spiral in space...and emerging from that spiral was a dragon with two arms and horns, skin on his back made out of mist, scales on his front made out of cloud, and a ghostly tail that was attached to the inside of the spiral.

"This is my true form…" he told them. "This is what I represent. Do you still wish to fight me, knowing full well that it would be a wasted effort? I'm not just the very reason why you are what you are now, nor am I just the reason why your universe is the way it is now...I am your universe. I merged myself with this world that I created. If you destroy me, you will destroy your universe. To fight me is to not only betray me, but to betray your universe. This is the truth...and I know that you can not bring yourselves to betray the truth."

"You're right…" they concurred. "That is a serious problem."

"And I can solve that problem if you simply surrender to me right now." the cloud dragon of the mist proposed. "We'll just end everything right this moment. Just allow the spiriting to happen...and I promise that you will be reborn in even better new bodies…"

"Keep dreaming." they retorted. "Not even if we were to lose to you. We will not make the same mistake as our predecessors, who trusted in The Risen One to solve all their problems for them and create a false utopia. We will solve the problem on our own, with the knowledge we'll gain from this battle with you."

"Ha ha ha ha ha." the cloud dragon of the mist laughed. "Ho ho ho ho ho. Even if I were to lose to you, there is no way to stop the spiriting. Even with me gone, the infinite stars of my world will carry on my will and continue to call mortal souls to this realm. Just accept it, fighting me is a futile cause. You will never destroy what I have built."

"Well, the joke's on you." the heroes taunted him. "Our goal isn't to destroy what you've built. Our goal is to make something better out of what you've built, to make it evolve. After all, aren't you yourself tired of doing the same thing over and over? Just as Discord and Rarity were?"

Only then did the cloud dragon of the mist feel a chill of fear surge throughout him…

"They know…" he thought, reflecting on how he poured some of his actual feelings on the story into Discord and Rarity.

"You think you're the only one who makes this story what it is?" the heroes continued. "No, you know that what really makes this story what it is are the characters you have created. You don't have the right to demean us just because you made us. You don't have the right to condescend to anyone you've dragged into this, because at least we're all changing...while you're still stuck playing the same kind of games. The way you have mocked all of us will be your downfall, for we will show you that the locomotive can change direction after it's painted a different color…"

It was then that the heroes brandished their weapons, with Myrick unsheathing her sword and katana, Fadrian putting up her dukes with knuckle dusters and potions filled with red liquid in her hands, and Spiro making a gun made of dark energy appear in his left hand and a gun resembling He Lives Forever, Myrick's secret weapon, appear in his right hand.

"...once we show you your final destination."

The cloud dragon of the mist just stared at the heroes solemnly, musing before he said…

"Such a valiant stance, I must commend you. However, you would succeed in killing me before succeeding in striking fear into me. I do not fear death or defeat…"

"Because you don't believe anything will change from your defeat…" the heroes replied, smirking. "...but you're wrong. Death is not defeat...death is change."

"You foolish children...you are wrong!" the cloud dragon of the mist exclaimed, growling and showing genuine anger for the first time. "You will not change me...YOU ARE THE ONES WHO MUST BE CHANGED!"

And with this battle cry, the fight commenced…the final duel of the universe of the Dark Sky would be between the heroes who became true gods and the lone survivor who turned out to be the true creator. One side was fighting for the dimension of worlds lost to the void to be found, the other side...had a motive known only to them...and to the soul of the Dark Sky inside of the cloud dragon of the mist…

"Sorry guys…" the soul apologized. "But there is no way we can let it end like that...not after we failed you and Spike. We'll be the ones to change the Dark Sky for you. After all, people don't change unless they're willing to change themselves…"

A glimmer of light could be seen inside the cloud dragon of the mist's mouth as it opened it to let loose a breath of chilling mist upon the heroes. All three of them jumped away, with Myrick leaping up and towards the dragon to slash at his head with her sword and katana. The mist merely split apart, but having expected this, Myrick used her newfound powers to instantly change the katana in her hand into a gauntlet. She smashed below, driving her fist into the dragon's now open throat.

"NOW FADRIAN!" Myrick exclaimed to signal to her comrade.

From below, Fadrian propelled herself into the air, spinning around to deliver a double uppercut to the dragon's lower body while Myrick drove down through its upper body from above. Eventually, their fists met after they had each completed plowing through their targets, with nothing left of the dragon but scattered mist and miniature clouds...until an explosion resulted from the intense energy of Myrick and Adrian's fists meeting, reducing all the surrounding mist and clouds to droplets of water.

"Hee hee hee hee hee…" the sound of Spike laughing could be heard from the spiral, as the form of his soul materialized at the ghostly tail. "So is this how you mean to change me? Acting as if you could actually destroy your immortal creator...you're the ones trapped in a bubble…"

"!" Myrick and Fadrian realized before they had a chance to react that the droplets of water were homing in on them from all sides, merging together around them to form a giant bubble, trapping them.

"And I'm going to be the one to burst it…" Spike said with a menacing smirk, about to snap his fingers and cause the bubble to compress and implode with what was inside like he had done when he was with Twilight and Maud Pie…

*click*

The sound of Spiro's light and dark guns being readied was heard as he suddenly appeared in front of Spike and put the guns to his head.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you, "master"..." Spiro warned Spike. "You'll regret-"

*click*

The sound of Spike snapping his fingers to cause the bubble to implode could be heard.

"You were saying?" Spike taunted. "What are you going to do now?"

"I was trying to warn you that you were wasting your time…" Spiro taunted right back as he gestured behind him to Myrick and Fadrian, who were unharmed inside of a red bubble that Fadrian had created using her newfound power to instantly create any mixture from any potions to protect them from the compact of Spike's bubble. "But since you want to die so badly…"

*BAM* *WAPOW*

Spiro fired both guns at once. The dark energy and light energy fired from each mixed together to form a blast destructive enough to completely obliterate the form Spike was in.

"...I may as well accommodate you." Spiro gleefully finished his taunt. "On the subject, are you ready to admit that we're stronger and accommodate us in return?"

"...No." Spike answered solemnly after a pause. "Not until you face the full blunt of my wrath…"

*CRACKLE* *ZAP*

All of a sudden, lightning came out of the portal faster than the speed of sound, giving Spiro and his comrades no time to evade as they were all shocked by the lightning and held in place by it. All of them used their light and dark energy to absorb the electricity coursing through their bodies and turn it into energy, but they could not escape the continually shocking lightning prison itself. If only they could conjure lightning too…

"I'm sure you all know the story by now, of how lightning came down and Satan fell…" Spike called back to the origin Dante spoke of in the world of the heralds. "If you are no different from him or the three devil gods who dared to defy me, this will be the end…the last thing you will see of me is my final form..."

It was then that Spike's form began to regenerate, but what materialized from his ghostly tail was not another dragon, but...Fluttershy lying on a cloud...that transformed into Twilight Sparkle...cradling Spike in her forelegs...

"?!" the heroes were shocked and confused by this sight. "The...Trinity? That's your final form?"

"Don't be fooled…" Fluttershy, Twilight, and Spike replied as they mixed together to form the cloud dragon of the mist, who now looked just like he did at the beginning of the battle. "It is still I, the cloud dragon of the mist. However, this is also the work of my greatest power of all that I obtain through The Trinity. It is the power of unity, but not as you know it. No, you three are the combination of mere beings coming together. I am not just three beings in one...I am three _trinities_ in one..."

"THREE TRINITIES?!" the heroes exclaimed. "THERE ARE THREE CLOUD DRAGONS OF THE MIST?! HOW CAN THAT BE?! HOW CAN THE STORY HAVE...three...authors..."

The heroes then looked at each other and realized the answer all at once. Watching this, the cloud dragon of the list got a maniacal smirk on his face before he said…

"Now the real question is...what happened to the fourth author?"

"NO!" the soul of the Dark Sky screamed. "DON'T YOU DARE! DON'T YOU DARE USE US AS LEVERAGE! WE'LL NEVER ALLOW THIS!"

The heroes gasped upon recognizing those voices…

"The Dark Sky members?!" they yelled. "How did they end up in your clutches?! What have you done to them?!"

The cloud dragon of the mist guffawed evilly as he held out his left hand, where the soul of the Dark Sky materialized as a ball of light surrounded by an aura of dark mist.

"Ho ho, leverage...what I did to them…" he mocked. "Your misunderstandings are laughable, like always. They voluntarily gave themselves up to me, and I am not holding them hostage with expectations of ransom for their safe return. What could I possibly do to them, and what could I possibly gain through using them as a negotiation tool? What leverage could I expect for offering you...a part of myself? The third and final cloud dragon of the mist...the holy dragon that set in motion the true ending that never ended...the ending the Spiriting world never got..."

"NO! NO! NO!" the heroes screamed.

"Yes, yes, yes." the cloud dragon of the mist taunted in a creepily calm tone of voice. "Your friends are also my friends. They chose to become permanently and eternally intertwined with me after they realized they had a responsibility in me becoming what I am now. A simple truth that they had long ignored. For me to die, they have to die too…"

"NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

The heroes bellowed the loudest and longest cry that had ever been made in the history of the universe of Fluttershy's Dark Sky. This was the final dilemma they had to face, and it was by far the hardest decision they would ever have to make. If they killed the cloud dragon of the mist, they would also kill their friends. But if they submitted to the cloud dragon of the mist…

...they would repeat the same mistake the gods before them made in the Awakening world, a mistake that had turned their world into a false utopia, an endless spiral…

...what could they do?

"The answer is simple." the cloud dragon of the mist interjected as the soul of the Dark Sky was sucked into the hand he held it in. "Nothing. Just let me handle everything. After all, it is the purpose of my existence, as the Spiriting world's creator, to fix this broken world through the spiriting...not yours. Just remain where you are and satisfy the wrath of God…"

It was then that every star in the sky began to glow with an incredible radiance and the cloud dragon of the mist held his arms out to the sky, saying...

"...as the spiriting finally commences…"

With that, the cloud dragon of the mist let his arms down, signaling for every star that was actually a soul to go to the mortal world and find a body to inhabit.

"It is finished." the cloud dragon said, talking in a creepy tone as he looked over to the heroes with a frightening smirk on his face. "Finally, my fantasy of reviving the world of Equestria is reality. Not only are all of my friends alive again and knowing of the truth, they have also finally become real. And I must thank you for helping me achieve my goal. You truly are worthy of witnessing my full power…"

"!" Myrick quickly pulled out He Lives Forever and fired several fiery shots from it up above, sensing a threat coming from there. However, the bullets merely phased through the approaching threat, as it turned out to be the final cloud dragon of the mist's body. Limited in ways to react from still being trapped in the lightning, the trio was helpless to avoid being gobbled up by the apparently soulless beast that winked at them before it devoured them.

"Heh heh heh…" the other cloud dragon of the mist laughed evilly. "I didn't just take the soul of the Dark Sky from it to prove to you the futility of your endeavor. I also did it in preparation for my finishing move...destroying you along with my final form…"

He snapped the fingers in both of his hands to cause the cloud mist dragon's body to implode in on itself with the heroes inside. Lightning went through every part of the dragon's body of cloud and mist that was squelched into water, creating a thunderous explosion that resounded with the loudest crackling boom the universe of the Dark Sky had ever known. The cloud dragon of the mist smiled wider than he ever had, as the spectacle was even better than he had expected. He even saw lightning come down from above and a soul come from below just before the explosion had happened, and everything before him vanished with a pop. He laughed, knowing that with him giving everything he had into his final stand, this would all end on a perfect note…

...for all that was left for him to do was go to the new world he created and celebrate a job well done…

...but as we all know, the end can only bring about a new beginning…

"Come on, wake up Twilight!" Spike exclaimed to Twilight Sparkle, standing on her bed sheets, shaking her awake to get her up. "We're going to miss the party!"

"Party?" Twilight replied, abruptly turning her head to look at Spike with a concerned look on her face. "Oh no, we aren't late for Maud's party, are we?"

"Maud's party?" Spike answered in a confused tone of voice. "That was yesterday, Twilight. Today's the day of Fluttershy's party. It's Awakening Day, remember?"

"Awakening Day?!" Twilight exclaimed, bursting out of bed, knocking Spike to the ground. "That's even worse! We can't be late to celebrate the day of our awakening! As the princess of friendship, I'd have to hang my head in shame forever if I disgraced the day that united all of the world in harmony! I'd never forgive myself for doing that to you and Fluttershy!"

"Relax, Twilight…" Spike said to comfort her as he picked himself off the floor. "We'd get over it…"

"Well, I know you guys would forgive me since you're my friends," replied Twilight as she and Spike headed out the door. "But what about the unsung heroes? What would they think?"

"I'm sure they'd think alike, ha ha…" Spike said as he laughed ominously and winked.

As he and Twilight walked through the town, ponies wearing sincere smiles on their faces waved to them, greeting them, "Good morning!", and, "Happy Awakening Day!", with innocent intentions. Among some of the folk who warmly welcomed them as they passed by were familiar faces, such as Sky Wanderer, Water Rinse, the Four Souls, Octavia, Tree Hugger, Vinyl Scratch, and Ken Tucke, Jason Celestia, the Goddess of Death, Prince Luna, Noava Rising, Arc Falling, both the Maud Pie clones and the god from the original church, Shining Armor, the bat ponies from B.A.T. Tiffany's, and even the Mane 6 and their robot alicorn counterparts. However, the most surprising familiar face of all was…

...the police officer who dismissed the dispute between Water Rinse and Ghost Rainbow Dash at Jelly Rockets.

"Still don't care about dick." he remarked as Twilight and Spike passed by him with puzzled expressions on their faces.

The most surprising familiar face that was also a new face, however, was none other than a reformed Queen Chrysalis, appearing as a transformed Changeling beside a reformed King Sombra.

"This truly is my favorite holiday!" Chrysalis proclaimed. "Thank you, heroes, for the new life you have given us!"

"Um...thanks?" Twilight responded sheepishly, feeling bashful.

"Come on, don't be modest!" Sombra exclaimed. "You have more than every reason to be proud for what you did this day! You sacrificed yourselves so that we could be reborn!"

"It really wasn't any trouble…" Twilight said, blushing and grinning.

"Yeah…" Spike interjected, speaking forebodingly again. "Especially not for me…"

It was soon that the two approached Ponyville Cemetery, where the Helllights, Gordon, Ricard, Leo, and Vincent, and the Nightbringers, Trish, Vergil, and Dante, awaited them, standing alongside Priest Loki, the human form of Akame, and Terra. All of them were there to help reenact the final scene of the battle that reshaped the entire world and brought new life to all those who were dead inside, including the honored guest of the party, Fluttershy. Not the Fluttershy who was with the Mane 6, nor the Fluttershy who was with The Trinity...but the Fluttershy who cried at a gravestone in the first story of the Dark Sky…

There she was just like back then, weeping at the tombstone. Spike slowly approached her to begin reenacting what happened after the cloud dragon of the mist came to earth. At that time, he, in the form of Spike, had come over to Fluttershy to pull her away from the grave and tell her that everything was going to be alright. That he had completed his mission to resurrect her dark sky and all of her friends...only to be told that he was wrong. Fluttershy moved away from the tombstone to show whose name was written on it, and Spike gasped as he realized that the one friend he had failed to save's name was…

 _Spike_

 _HERE LIES THE CLOUD DRAGON OF THE MIST, CREATOR OF THE UNIVERSE_

"It...it can't be!" the cloud dragon of the mist exclaimed in terror that night. "This is a lie! I can't be dead! Ah...ah..."

Feeling disoriented from the shock, he staggered backwards, only to be struck by a bolt of lightning from a dark cloud, one of the same dark clouds that had appeared around Fluttershy's house in the first story of the Dark Sky and in the world where Myra discovered the power of fusing Yin and Yang. As the lightning coursed through his body, he let out a shriek of agony, writhing in pain as he saw Rarity's ghost before his eyes.

"WHY…" Spike said as he also saw Prince Luna appear beside Rarity's ghost along with Fluttershy. "WHY HAVE YOU ALLOWED THIS TO HAPPEN TO ME?! I CREATED ALL THIS BEAUTY! I SAVED THE UNIVERSE FOR YOU! I OPENED EVERYONE'S EYES TO THE TRUTH!"

"Forgive me, but I must tell you otherwise." Luna retorted. "In the creation of your beauty, you also created a big mess. Those heroes are the ones who saved the universe, and Yata was the one responsible for spreading their truth throughout. They are the only reason anyone will ever know what the fuck you were trying to do."

"I'm sorry, Spikey-wikey…" Rarity's ghost sympathized with him. "But what you have created in your story is simply not very good. We understand that you're not a professional writer, but it's part of the truth that needs to be heard in order for you to be set free…"

"..."

Spike simply had the longest pause in silence the universe of the Dark Sky had known, as he had no clue how to respond to even the ones he looked up to going against what he believed…

"...Set free to what?" he finally asked.

"Free to meet the end you always wanted." Fluttershy told him, smiling sweetly. "It's also the end I'll never stop wanting...the true ending that never ends...because the end of something that has served its purpose only means that something new will take its place to fulfill a new purpose. So Spike, what is it that you want? To be trapped inside of a world that is simply an endless spiral, an endless end...or do you want to be part of a new beginning?"

"...I want to be part of a new beginning." Spike answered solemnly. "The heroes were right. I am tired of living the same story again and again. They say insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result. I just keep pouring out more and more nonsense from my imagination, trying to rationalize it over and over, expecting to one day get that perfect truth that will make me and everyone in my world happy...but that was a pointless pursuit from the start. Not because it's something I could never do...but because it's something I don't need to do. The truth is far greater than I…"

With that, Spike felt his entire being transform into light energy along with the lightning that struck him. The cloud carried him up, absorbing him. As the cloud rose into the dark sky, Spike realized what had happened…

"...and so are those who stand for the truth." Spike finished as he realized that this was the work of the heroes, who had survived his final attack. The three fiery bullets Myrick shot in the sky had created a cumulonimbus cloud from the heat distorting the atmospheric stability. The lightning that struck them from above was from their own cloud absorbing them inside to avoid the attack, and the soul from below was the soul of the Dark Sky. Unbeknownst to him, they had put a piece of their soul in the final cloud dragon of the mist's body, sacrificing themselves so that he could be defeated…

"So that's why they turned against me…" Spike said tearfully, crying harder than he ever had. "That's why I'm dead...BECAUSE THE SOUL OF THE DARK SKY, MY OWN UNIVERSE IS DEAD!"

…..

 _Go down to rise up._

"Huh?" Spike went in response to hearing the heroes say that. "Did you just quote…"

"We promised you that we would change the direction of the locomotive." the heroes told him. "Now that we comprehend your truth and the truth of the Dark Sky along with our own, it's finally time to show you our final destination, a place we're all going to go to. And it won't be the Dark Sky as a collection of worlds lost to the Void...but as a collection of worlds that have been found by the light..."

 _What is life?_

The heroes then put their hands together in a circle, pouring out all of the power, combining all of the light and dark energy inside of them to create a massive energy ball containing power that swirled inside of it to create a cyclone...spinning in a counterclockwise direction…

 _A journey that is meant to ultimately lead us to enlightenment and salvation…after we walk a road filled with many turns that allow us to discover the eternal truth we shall carry with us after death…_

"We're not going to ever come up with a twist bigger than this…" the heroes made one more remark before the end. They shot the cyclone from their hands at the spiral Spike, the cloud dragon of the mist had created, as he said his final words before the end…

 _...the ultimate change…_

As the cyclone collided with the spiral, an explosion like no other covered the entire universe. Light and darkness flooding all throughout, Spike's ghostly tail undoing the endless spiral that had once kept his imagination contained. Now, it was spread all throughout the universe, just like the truth Yata had spread. Everything ended in an explosion like no other…

...since the Big Bang, the explosion that started everything…

After the end, Spike, the cloud dragon of the mist's final words were this, as seen on his tombstone by all who were celebrating Awakening Day…

 _Congratulations, heroes. You brought the greatest of light to the darkest dark sky I could ever create. Through my death, I have left you this message as proof of what mortal life is…_

Later, at the end of Awakening Day, Spike watched the stars alongside all of his friends...including the heroes who had saved him. They were now the final Trinity that completed him. Together, the new cloud dragon of the mist finished those final words with the heroes as they looked up in the sky and saw their favorite constellation…

"Our preparation for eternal life."

The constellation that was revealed to be the shape of the Dark Sky members, the stars that represented their souls, thought so too. Not just the five, Fluttershy was there with them, and with a smile on her face, she said her final words…

"Now the most important story can finally begin…because you never gave up the most important truth of all...the truth that creates unity...the essence of all worlds…

...our eternally unified, reborn soul..."


End file.
